


The Fall of the Butterfly

by TheCanadianInfernape



Series: The Butterfly Trilogy [1]
Category: Star vs. The Forces Of Evil
Genre: Developing Relationship, Dreams vs. Reality, Duty, Evil Corporations, Existential Crisis, F/M, Flashbacks, Friendship/Love, Magic and Science, Past Relationship(s), Powerlessness, Science, inventions, obligations
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-03
Updated: 2016-08-11
Packaged: 2018-05-31 00:25:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 43,518
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6448057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheCanadianInfernape/pseuds/TheCanadianInfernape
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After four years of weird and wild adventures, Marco and Star are separated by their own individual obligations. After a series of conflicts strikes the Mewni Dimension, their reunion finally comes, albeit unexpected.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Promotion

**Author's Note:**

> Originally uploaded to Fanfiction.net on March 28, 2016.  
> Converted to AO3 on April 4, 2016.

**The Dimension of Mewni**  
**The Butterfly Kingdom**  
**Four years after Star's return to Mewni.**

"I must stay strong for the Mewnians... everybody."

As Princess Star Butterfly walked along the stretched red-carpeted corridor of the Butterfly dimension, she thought about this often. Her mother, Queen Moon, was dying. The entire kingdom would be at her disposal soon, and as she knew, many historians and critics of the Butterfly lineage would question if she were ready.

As she withheld the stress from her insecurities and pressures, Star entered a door to her right, peeking in to find a small hospital bed. The white-coated nurse greeted the Butterfly Princess as she went in.

"Ah, Princess Star," the nurse said as she looked up, acknowledging Star's authority. "Your mother is here as always. Just fed her some food."

"Thank you, Ingrid," Star said, but did not look at the nurse, only to her weakened mother on the tattered hospital bed. Both of her eyes were shut as she seemed to be embraced in a deep slumber. The nurse, Ingrid, put a hand on Star's shoulder.

"Also," Ingrid said quietly, "I have something important to tell you." Ingrid put her lips close to Star's ear, and whispered softly. Star knew that it couldn't be good.

"Your mother has gotten weaker since I last checked in on her hours ago," Ingrid spoke softly, with a sense of remorse on her tongue. "She is in really bad shape. I don't think she can live much longer."

Star's eyes begin to widen, as she did her best to try not to cry in front of Ingrid. Ingrid had been a very good friend to her in the last few months that her mother was in the hospital, either way. Ingrid would be willing to miss some of her off-duty breaks just to care for the Queen, something which Star respected of all the other nurses that cared for her mother. Ingrid seemed to almost immediately sensed Star's feelings, as the nurse began to give her a comforting hug. Star felt a slight sense of security, and it had reminded her old Earth friend, Marco.

She sighed once her thoughts collected Marco's name. Marco Diaz. The boy who she left on Earth four years after. Would he remember her as she remembered him? The blonde, blue-dressed princess remembered her current position, and backed off from the hug, with the nurse looking at her with mild concern.

"Well then," the nurse said, after a brief silence, "I'll leave you alone with your mother then. I'll see you, Star."

"Bye," Star said blankly. Her mind was incoherent as she looked from her mother's bedside. The queen was awake tonight, but her eyes were half open, mostly due to fatigue.

"Star-r-r-r..." her mother spoke wearily, clearly enjoyed to see her daughter once again, though she talked softer, unlike her usual shrill self.

"Yes mother," Star asked as the Queen raised her weak, elderly hand to Star's arm.

"Thanks for visiting again," the Queen said, smiling weakly to her only daughter. "Now, I called for you here because, I have some... very important issues to bring up with you."

"Yes mother," Star repeated again.

"Now, as you know, you are a young woman now. Around twenty-some years of age?"

"Twenty-one," Star said briefly, quickly kneeling by the Queen's bedside as she spoke.

"Yes, sorry," the old Queen said. "My old mind can't collect things the way it used to. Now can I sit up for a second?" Star pressed a button on the side of the hospital bed, which retracted so her mother could sit vertically. Star noted that her mother was getting weaker and weaker with every passing moment, as seen through the inability to press a simple button.

"Now, anywho, like I said before... I obviously don't have much time to live, as the nurse may or may not have pointed out. Therefore I assume the Queenly duties to you. You've trained for about seven long years for this." Star awkwardly looked at herself through her mother's bedside mirror. Had she changed since leaving Marco? Was she good enough to keep the Kingdom of Mewni strong? As she pondered these questions, her mother kept speaking. "I would give you a speech about the huge responsibility given this kingdom, but you've heard it so many times anyways."

 _Obviously_ , thought Star. _It is a big responsibility. What's your point?_

 _"_ The point being," the Queen stated, "There's something I think you'd wanna know, a little unwritten rule, shall we say it, before ruling Mewni."

"Don't worry mother," replied Star unshaken, "I think I'll be fine, regardless of what it is."

"No, daughter," the Queen said, reaching out her arm weakly to Star. "Since you h-h-haven't a suitor for the newest king yet, we will place k-kingship, in t-t-temporary charge."

"WHAT!?" Star shouted, hand over her mouth in shock. "Why can't I rule on my own?"

"We cannot break a trend that... that... that... has been in the g-g-generations of the Butterfly Kingdom."

"I don't need a suitor or a king," scoffed Star, as she turned away from her mother to look out through the palace window.

"Now, Star, *cough*" the Queen sputtered out, "Do what you like *cough*, but you know you'll have to face the music later. We've prepared your whole life for this moment, and if you won't come out of your shell and reach for the stars, it will never come again."

The princess looked back and sighed. "So, can you tell me who you picked as my suitor?"

The Queen, with half-opened eyes, stood silent.

"Please don't be Tom, PLEASE DON'T BE TOM," the blue-dressed princess hollered in hysterics, "ANYTHING BUT TOM!"

"Star," the Queen quickly rose her hand, "Don't be *cough* so daft. I can't put up *cough* with this much longer."

"Sorry."

Queen Moon laughed modestly, "I wouldn't do that to you, Star, who *cough* do you think I am? Miss *cough* Heinous?"

Star gave out a chuckle. When the laughter died several seconds of silence quickly followed.

"I think," the Queen said, breaking the silence, "Your father will be in charge for the while, before we will find you a suitor. It's all up *cough* to you, Star. I won't force who you *cough* want as the *cough* King."

"Alright mum," Star replied.

"Come here, Star," the Queen spoke cheerfully, inviting Star with wide arms. Star accepted her arms and the two were locked in an embrace. As the two hugged, Star noticed her mother's grip getting weaker. As she looked at her mother's face, she stared in horror, seeing her mother's eyes were wide open, her face not moving. Her mother's body slouched on the bed, falling gently out of the princess's grasp. Instead of an air of calm and serenity, Star was met with a fear of the inevitable.

"INGRID," she screamed, jumping up and calling for her nurse, "HELP, MY MOTHER'S BLACKED OUT!"

As Star paced around the room in a panic, she took a vase sitting on a side-table next to the and chucked it across the room.

"PLEASE DON'T BE DEAD, PLEASE DON'T BE DEAD, PLEASE DON'T BE DEAD." Star's hysterics died down and turned to sadness as she fell on both knees beside her mother's bedside. She hit the side of the hospital bed, her mother still slouched with her eyes wide open.

"Star, what happ..." broke out Ingrid, who just scurried the room. She looked at the Queen's fallen body on the bed, and knew she couldn't do anything now.

Instead, Ingrid focused her attention to the devastated daughter. Ingrid knelt down and stood the princess up, walking her out of the room. Star Butterfly's eyes were closed, swelling from the tears. Ingrid said nothing else, except for one minute line.

_"May the space god be with you, Queen Butterfly."_

* * *

**Earth**  
**_Explorer Corporation_ Headquarters  
** **Echo Creek, CA**

"Alright, Mr. Diaz. You have ten minutes to explain why our corporation should hire you. Give me everything that you have."

Marco Diaz, now a young Mexican adult, was sitting in an office chair, placed adjacently to the CEO's desk, to where Explorer CEO James Martin, spoke. The CEO was a tall with a long set of hair. He appeared in his 40s, but didn't come off as a gruff or serious-looking man. Marco was afraid of an experienced employee asking him the questions, but he found it even scarier to be talking directly to Mr. Martin.

"Um, shouldn't you be asking the questions, Mr. Martin?" Marco asked nervously.

"Oh, so the boy's a bit of a rebel, eh?" Martin snickered, "Very well then. Why don't you tell me about your _alma mater_?"

"Um," Marco paused, "I had a Bachelor's Degree in Engineering here at Echo Creek College."

"Interesting," Martin pondered, pacing himself between the constraints of his office. "I'd ask about how college was for four years without a dorm and living in your parent's basement, but now's not the time. Anywho, do you have any idea what our company does?"

 _"Questioning the World, Evolving the World."_ Marco had recited the company's motto. "You guys have many different fields, like inventing different mechanisms as well as in the field of bio-medicine which examines genetics to find cures to the most incurable of diseases."

"Someone's been doing some research," the witty CEO replied, grin still plastered on his face, "Now tell me, Mr. Diaz, what kind of problems do you want to solve in our world, and why do you think our company will help you get there?"

"Huh," Marco was caught off guard with the question. However, Martin still did not show any frustration and stayed collected during the interview.

"Sorry, that question gets a lot of people," chuckled Martin, "When I think about hiring a person for the first time, often the question that pops up in everyone's head is 'what they want to be when they grow up.' That solitary statement good, but not great. It often comes up as 'I want to be a electrical engineer', or other questions."

He paused a bit, looking right at Marco's nervous and sweaty face. "No, when I look for an employee, I ask them 'what kind of problems they want to solve in their future.' I am a firm believer that everyone has a gift from God. We all have a purpose to live on the Earth. The question asks them about what they want to solve, how they want to impact a world and make it greater than it already is. Just wanting to be an electrical engineer doesn't tell us about how you change the world. A better question, wouldn't you agree, Mr. Diaz?"

Marco nodded his head slowly. "Yes sir, I believe the problems I want to solve are very tech-oriented. Because we live in such a world where technology is key, I want to fix technology when it goes wrong."

Martin nodded. "I couldn't agree more. Our world is often technology oriented. We use our phones every day, we drive cars or take trains to go to work. With all of this power, anybody can become very wealthy with tons of effort put in, like this very corporation, not to brag."

Martin opened a drawer from his desk and pulled out a stack of sorted papers, filled with resumes. "Marco Diaz, correct?" Martin spoke, to which Marco nodded. As Martin flipped through the papers, he managed to find Marco's, which he had submitted the past week.

"I'm just checking your resume." Martin declared as he went through the contents of the resume. "Criminal Record, none. Drinking or Drug related issues, none. Model student in both high school and college, Applying for the Mechanical Engineering job, and you've graduated from college just this year. Is any of this information incorrect, and are you just fibbing? Such a safe kid, eh?"

Marco nodded his head no, though he was bothered with what Martin had just said. Placing the paper flat on his desk, Martin walked over and stood near Marco and stared him down. Marco was intimidated by the man and shrunk in his chair.

"Marco Ubalbo Diaz," Martin said with a smile, "You've done something that has really impressed me. Out of all the applications and interviews I have done with college graduates in the past month, you have displayed what seems to be the most commitment to getting this job. You might want to work on your self-confidence though."

He gave his hand out to Marco. "Welcome to the _Explorer Corporation_. I hope you make the company proud."

Marco's eyes widened, as he shook Martin's hand. "Thank you, sir." He honestly couldn't believe that he got the job. Amazed, he was about to walk out of the door.

"Oh, and don't forget Marco," Martin stated, just stopping him before he walked out the door. "Your job starts at 7 AM tomorrow. I'll get an employee to show you around the workplace tomorrow. Please take it easy on the celebrations tonight. I don't want have to sack you tomorrow."

"Yes, thanks Mr. Martin." Marco gave a light smile, before heading out of the office.

* * *

Marco went home to his small apartment, which he had just rented through his spare scholarship money. The first thing he did when he got home was remove his coat and rummage through his refrigerator to grab a can of light beer. Marco normally didn't drink, unlike his two best friends, Alfonzo and Ferguson, who had a drink every time he hung out with them after college hours. Marco made a vow to limit himself to have one drink a week or less, which seemed all the more important with his new job to maintain.

As Marco slung himself on his living room couch, sipping from the can, drowning out his thoughts on the current day, his eyes wandered around the tidy room. He was thinking about watching some television, but as he reached for the remote, he felt he would only be able to watch TV in sobriety. As he looked around the room for a book to read, or something to do, his eyes caught a single photograph, locked in a black photo-frame.

Marco put down his beer can and picked up the black photo-frame. It was a picture of him and his old friend Star Butterfly, the photocopy that Marco had kept. Star was seen, her arm slung over his shoulder while giving the peace sign. It was taken when Marco was at his happiest. Sighing, he recollected his memories of her. The times that they had fought monsters together, the times that the two went dimension hopping, he craved for those days in high school with Star, as without her, all the excitement, all the love in his life had mostly diminished.

Marco didn't let go of the photograph for a long time.

* * *

**5 years ago**

Star ran all across her room, searching for the many things she may have forgotten, placing them into Star's huge treasure chest to make sure she was ready. Marco sat on her bed, studying for his college placement exams.

"Star, I'm gonna miss... OOF!" Star, with her eyes watering, had leapt on Marco on the bed, hugging him for such a long time. She showed no intention of letting him go, letting her emotions get to her.

"I'm going to miss you, Mark," chuckled Star, while tears streamed down her face, pulling him even tighter.

"Hey," Marco bluffed at the nameswap, but returned the hug. "I'll miss you too, Star."

As the Star skipped down the stairs while Marco hauled the luggage down the stairs, Marco's parents greeted her. Their eyes were red, like they had cried in the past hour or so. Marco's mother, Mrs. Diaz did nothing but welcome Star into her arms.

"We're going to miss you, _nuestra pequeña mariposa,_ " said Mr. Diaz as Star moved to give him a big hug.

"Thanks you guys," sighed Star, embracing the emotion of this particular moment, "I love you guys too, and I'll always remember you."

Marco, who stayed silent during the entire scenario, looked at the small litter of laser-eye puppies lying on the ground... "What about the puppies?"

"Oh, you guys can keep them," Star waved off, petting one of the puppies on the head. "Oh, who's a good boy Mister Fluffykins? Starry's gonna miss you too!"

"Hey Star, want to take one more last walk through Echo Creek?"

"Would I," Star beamed, her silly little grin on her face. "I can say goodbye to everybody!"

* * *

Marco heaved the large treasure chest along the sidewalk, while Star bid her farewells... to everybody and everything.

"Bye cars," beamed Star, waving a hand to the cars parked on the side-road, "Bye squirrels in the trees, bye birds in the sky, bye Jackie Lynn Thomas!" Marco blushed, seeing the blonde girl skate by on her skateboard. Jackie waved back at the two of them.

Star finally completed her tour which ended on the tallest hill at Echo Creek Park. Exhausted, Marco nearly collapsed from heaving the heavy luggage around the park. Star bounded to the top of the hill, to see the entire town showered by a red sunset glow. Overlooking the view, they could see the school, Marco's home, and everything else. Marco walked towards Star, observing the beauty of the view with her. They spoke about the many adventures they had together, recollecting each one with laughs and tears involved.

"Just thinking about the many adventures we had here amazes me," Star said in amazement, "We definitely did a lot, eh, partner?"

"Yeah," Marco agreed. "Sure did."

As the two looked out towards the skyline, Star replied, "Y'know, through these four years I've been on Earth, there was one thing that stood out."

"And what would that be per se?" Marco smirked.

"Obviously I'd say Oskar Greason!" Star blurted out. Marco fumed.

"Really? You spend four years here and all you can think abo..."

Star put a finger to his lip. "I'm just kidding, Safe Kid. You stood out of my time here. I finally had someone who liked battling monsters with me. You're almost like my brother. Maybe even more. Also, did I mention you're really gullible?"

Marco laughed, "Says Princess Cuckoo-Head. Y'know Star, all seriousness aside, you're pretty something."

"Please Marco," spoke Star sheepishly, "Using the line from _Paper Towns_. How cliché. _"_

"That's the only line that I can use perfectly in this moment, Miss Butterfly."

Then, before he could react, Star pulled herself closer to Marco and gave him a small kiss on the mouth. Though surprised at the ordeal, Marco slowly returned it. The kiss hadn't lasted long, but it was enough to quench his desires.

When they pulled apart, the feeling was gone, replaced by the fear of Star's inevitable absence in Marco's life.

Star heard her small magical wristwatch beep. "Well, I guess this is goodbye. I hope I have time to visit Earth again, but..." She pulled out her dimensional scissors and slashed a portal open. "You could come with me if you want."

Marco had to decline the offer, "Star, as much as I would like to, I'm sorry. I have far too many goals to work towards on Earth. I have to graduate from college, you have to become Queen of Mewni... We're choosing different paths."

"I understand," Star replied sweetly, as she shoved her chest into the portal, "Goodbye Marco."

"Goodbye Star."

Marco gave her one last wave before she slowly descended into the portal. As soon as the portal close, a tear slid down Marco's face, confused about the events that had just conspired.

* * *

As Marco awoke from his slumber on the couch, he looked at his bedside digital clock. It was 5 PM. He had been out for about two hours. He also realized that he had still been holding the photograph in his hand while he slept. Putting it away, his cellphone rung.

Marco picked it up, "Hello?"

A girl's voice was on the other end of the line spoke, "Marco, what's up? I haven't talked to you since College Grad!"

Marco recognized that voice. "Jackie? Long time no talk! What's up?"

"Nothing much Marco," spoke Jackie, "Alfonso told me you had an interview with Explorer Corporation. How'd it go?"

"Great, I actually got the job, so that's a start."

"Congratulations man! Y'know, since we haven't talked for a while, why don't we set up a date to celebrate? We can go to that Chinese restaurant, um, what was its name again, Wong's Cuisine?"

"I don't know Jackie," Marco said with a slight hesitation, "I've got work tomorr..."

"Oh, Marco," replied Jackie teasingly, "It's just a _date_. We can just eat there and walk downtown, then we'll be back just before your bedtime, alright?"

Marco questioned himself if he would go out, and risk tiring himself out on his first work day. He finally obliged. "You got yourself a date. What time?"

"I don't know, 6:15 sound good to you?"

"Deal."


	2. The Good Samaritan

**Wong's Cuisine**  
**Echo Creek, CA**  
**6:00 PM**

"Did you hear that Ferguson has a new girlfriend?"

Marco's eyes widened as he picked another mouthful of white rice with his chopsticks. "Really?"

Jackie Lynn Thomas was wearing a dark blue dress with some dark eyeliner. This was the same beautiful style that Marco had grown accustomed to falling in love with. They had gone on dates countless times in college, but most of them were very platonic. "Yeah, he texted me at six A.M. this morning and spent the whole hour bragging about her. What a creep." She then proceeded to show Marco the entire conversation on her smartphone.

"Sounds like Ferguson, alright." said Marco, nodding. "He even tried to hook up some Fairy Pixie Queen back when Star brought us to another dimension in one of our crazy adventures."

"What a creep. I pity the poor girl," repeated Jackie, acknowledging Marco's previous statement. "Speaking of Star, how's she been doing on Mewtwo, or whatever you call it?"

"Mewni," corrected Marco, quickly slurping down on a fried noodle bowl. "I haven't talked to her in three years."

"THREE years?" asked the blonde haired girl in pure shock. "You mean you two haven't had a conversation or anything?"

"She doesn't even have any form of social media, or even a mobile phone," explained Marco. "She even promised to come back to visit but I guess she had some obligations on Mewni or something."

"Aw man," Jackie fumed as she kept eating her food, "She was the coolest. Remember the time that she turned Ms. Skullnick into a troll?"

"Do I," snickered Marco. "I remember the time me and Star went to this exact restaurant, and I fooled her into thinking Fortune Cookies were magic."

"Oh my god, really?" asked Jackie with a sense of surprise in her voice. "That sounds freaking hilarious!"

"Funny thing is, most of those fortunes actually came true."

Jackie laughed, but returned to her more serious of poses. "I can tell that you really miss her, Marco."

"No duh," said Marco, twitching at the words from Jackie's lips. "I think everyone misses her, and is there a way to tell if a person misses someone, or have I just not noticed?"

"I just think you don't really hang out with the real people in your life anymore," noticed Jackie, who was holding a concerned look on her face. "You've grown distant from all of us, your friends, ever since Star left."

"I know," sighed Marco, looking down at his bowl. "I think I kinda just forgot everything else after she left."

"But Marco," Jackie cut in, giving him a flirtatious look, "I do have to admit I never noticed you before she came, either."

Marco blinked. "Yeah, she was really trying to convince me to talk to you, too."

"I bet." replied Jackie with a laugh, "Before high school, I always saw you as that weird Mexican kid who just looked at me with googly eyes and spoke like a baby whenever he tried to talk to me. I never saw you as Marco Diaz. When Star came, I think that's when things changed."

"Amen to Star Butterfly," announced Marco gleefully, lifting his china teacup to Jackie's, who raised hers up too. The cups met with a 'cling' as they both sipped on the hot tea.

* * *

Outside of the restaurant, Marco and Jackie crossed the street as Marco rushed to unlock his small blue 1998 Civic coupe. Jackie was about to wave goodbye to Marco, but Marco stopped her.

"Why don't I drive you home," said Marco, "It's getting rather chilly outside tonight."

"Thanks Marco, that means I won't have to hail a Uber. Y'know how pricey and hard to find those are?" exclaimed Jackie in relief. She hopped into the passenger's seat and closed the door. Marco sped off through the traffic, while observing the bright flashing city lights of downtown Echo Creek.

After several minutes of observation and silence, Jackie finally broke it. "I've never heard of _Explorer Corporation_ before. What do they do exactly?"

"Something in the biochemical areas where they test medicines," said Marco, grasping the steering wheel. "They also make machinery, from something as tame as print copiers, to something as harmless as armed weaponry."

"Sounds like the safest kid in Echo Creek Academy finally decided to take a risk," chuckled Jackie as she smirked. "And you're a mechanical engineer?"

"Yup. Someone is going to guide me around the office building tomorrow."

"Cool," said Jackie, staring out the window. "Y'know Marco, I wish I were as smart as you."

"Why's that?"

"Y'know," pondered Jackie, "What you seem to be doing right now seems to be making you happy, and probably lots of cash as well. Maybe if I had your intelligence I would be able to get to where you are now. I don't even know what I want to be. I was always seen as one of those cool kids. I always wished life was about skateboarding around town and having fun. I didn't settle in and grow up until it was too late. Now I'm travelling on a path I don't like, because I didn't spend the time to think about what I wanted to be. At least you got the job you wanted."

Marco sighed, recalling the wise words of his new boss, James Martin. "It's not about what you want when you grow up, Jackie. It's about what kind of problems you want to solve in life. What do you want to solve in life?"

Jackie replied, "I always wanted to, y'know, make people happy. Make people put down their sorrows and miseries and be happier."

"Jackie. People take more time than others to find their place in the world. That's totally normal. We have different goals in life. Different paths in life. Different destinies."

Jackie gave Marco a light grin. "Exactly why you and Star couldn't stay together?"

Marco blushed at this statement and stayed silent. "I don't have romantic feelings for Star, if that's what you're talking about."

"Oh c'mon, Marco," exclaimed Jackie, giving him a light punch on the arm as he was driving. "You know I saw you two kissing in the park that day when she left for Mewni."

"Y-y-you saw us?" Marco's face turned redder than ever.

"Yup, you seemed to be enjoying it too."

"Well," retorted a flustered Marco, "That was just Princess Cuckoo-Pants being cuckoo! I was just letting her have her way."

"Marco," said Jackie with her eyes slanting. "I might be an idiot at getting a job, but you're an idiot at recognizing your feelings."

Marco blushed even more, and didn't even speak for the rest of the trip.

The Civic pulled up on the driveway of the Thomas' house. Jackie gave Marco a light kiss on the cheek.

"Thanks for the ride, lover boy," the blonde girl announced slyly, before closing the car door and walking back inside.

As Marco backed out of the driveway, that same tender and warm feeling from when Star kissed him all those years ago returned.

* * *

Marco drove home quickly along the rather quiet road. It wasn't very eventful, and it was a very curvy road up a hill, much like those routes as seen through an anime he had watched, _Initial D_. The Civic flowed seamlessly along every corner of the road. It was perfect night for a late night drive without distractions, without traffic stops or amounts of traffic. The route offered a stunning view of the city skyline, greater than even the park, observed from his left.

As he made a slow right turn, a flash of bright grey caught Marco's eye. Shielding his eye from the flash, he assumed it was just another car passing by with very bright headlights. The flash resided, and Marco kept driving at normal pace. However, through the long glare of his headlights, he caught a medium sized, grey boulder in his peripheral view.

"HOLY SH-" screamed Marco as he gritted his teeth, slamming on the brakes so tensely that the Civic was almost sent into a powerslide as Marco jerked the steering wheel the other direction. Miraculously, he didn't crash into the guardrail surrounding the roads or even the grey object he tried to avoid.

When the panic subsided, Marco saw that, upon closer inspection, that the boulder wasn't even a boulder at all. It was a creature, which also possessed a rather large black beak, holding a bat-winged staff and wearing a huge ox skull on its head.

Ludo.

Marco's jaw dropped. He jumped out of his car (almost literally for that matter), and walked toward the small bird creature in a defensive pose. "Ludo, you'd better have a good reason for returning to the Earth dimension. You almost killed me!"

"How did you know my name, lowly Earth peasant," shrieked Ludo. He looked up to the larger Marco. "Say, aren't you that guy who was Star's bodyguard all those years ago?"

"I have a name y'know," the Mexican hissed. "Marco Diaz. Otherwise yes, I was Star's 'bodyguard'."

"Well, just great," spoke Ludo sadly, plopping his bum on the ground. "First I find out Star Butterfly's the Queen of Mewni, and now I run into my second most-hated enemy! You should've just hit me."

"Wait," probed Marco, "What did you just say?"

"Now I've run into my second-most hated enemy. YOU, ya pathetic Earthling. Why didn't you hit me?"

"No no no, before that."

"Star Butterfly's the Queen of Mewni," said Ludo, sadly. "Her mother just died. Now it'll be pointless to steal the wand, especially with all the security she's got with her right now."

"Star's the Queen of Mewni?!" replied an surprised Marco.

Marco was aghast for a second, but remembered who he was dealing with and began to probe further. "Cut the act, Ludo. Why are you REALLY here?"

"I just wanted to visit. Earth's my favourite dimension," Ludo replied, "They have-uh-some of the best oysters of all the other dimensions around."

"Then where is your monster army? Shouldn't they have charged at me and try to kill me right now?"

Ludo suddenly began to sob. "The army's finished. They all went back to their home dimensions. We figured 'hey, since Star's Queen, how can we even steal the wand now?'"

"WHAT?" Marco was busy processing all of this news, while Ludo was sobbing on the road. "So Star's Queen of Mewni and your army has disbanded."

"Precisely. Hold on," replied Ludo, before blowing his nose on Marco's larger red hoodie. Marco stared at it with both silence and disgust.

"Um..." Marco said, mouth hanging wide open. "Do you even know where to go on Earth? If you haven't noticed, this dimension's huge."

"I hadn't really thought about that," mused Ludo while wiping a tear. "I'm just lonely with nothing to do."

Knowing that Ludo had no motive, and acknowledging that the monster probably didn't want anything from him anyways, Marco made a swift decision. "Why don't you crash out at my home tonight?" said Marco, almost automatically.

Ludo quickly stopped crying and flashed out a silly grin. "Would you really do that *sniff*, for me."

"Of course. Under one condition."

"Ugh, I hate this part," grunted Ludo, hopping into the passenger seat of Marco's car, while Marco confidently plopped into the driver's seat. "What is it, ex-bodyguard?"

"You have to tell me more about what's happened on Mewni."

* * *

Back at home, Ludo rushed into the house, the fatigued Marco trudging behind him.

"Alright, off to my bed," said a sheepish Marco, as he escorted Ludo to his bed. Ludo jumped in and quickly snuggled in the covers, head gently laying on the pillow. Before Marco tucked him in, he stood behind to ask.

"Wait, Ludo,"

"Make it quick. I haven't slept all day." Ludo replied crankily.

"Why did you suddenly give up now? I thought you spent your whole life trying to get that wand."

"No," sighed Ludo, recollecting his past and feeling the tears coming. "Not my whole life. There's things that happened in my life that made me steal the wand."

"Why is that?" asked Marco, filled with more curiosity.

"Just great, you're trying to make me cry so you can buttkick my bottom back to Mewni," said Ludo sarcastically, "But fine, I'll tell you and go through my past sorrows, just because you saved me."

"I'm not trying to make you cry," said Marco, putting his hand around Ludo's back, "I just feel like it's something I should-"

"You ever heard of *sniff* Mewnipendence Day," sniffled Ludo, yet again using Marco's hoodie as a handkerchief.

Marco ignored the slimy monster mucus on his hoodie while remembering the one day that Star had taught him on Mewni. "You lost your land permanently to the Mewmans, and your family was murdered by them?"

"My parents," cried Ludo, wetting the bed with his tears, "What you hear from the Butterfly's propaganda isn't true. It was all because one little monster attacked the Mewmans. They got scared and decided to wage war on us. It's not even Mewnipendence because we didn't even liberate the Mewmans. They just saw us there and drove us out."

Ludo continued his exposition, "In that final *sniff* battle that would decide the governmental status of Mewni, the _Great Monster Massacre at Mewni's Crossing_ , *sniff* my father enlisted to join the army to protect my village...

* * *

**Mewni's Crossing  
Several years ago**

"SOUND THE TRUMPETS!"

A trumpet blew, the single sign for the Mewmans to charge for glory.

Back at the monster's village, composed of many wooden shacks, an grey femalle bird monster hugged a male bird monster. The male bird was very muscular, compared to the others in the village. He was known as Kremar. Kremar's preteen aged bird child looked on.

"Please don't do this," cried the wife in agony, "Those Mewmans have killed tons of us in the past, and I don't want to bury you!"

As the wife stood crying, the muscular husband consoled her, "I'm sorry, dear Ika, but I must do this to save my people." He looked onwards and gave the small child bird monster a pat on the head. "Ika, please look after little Ludo for me."

Ika lay on the ground sobbing, closely hugging her little son as tight as she could. Kremar suited up for battle, and ascending into the plain field.

Kremar, along with tons of other monsters, approached the heavily fortified Mewman side. Without showing fear, Kremar lifted his only weapon, a long staff with a mace-like end to it. He was the first to charge.

Whacking the first Mewman off his Warnicorn, Kremar quickly lifted his left arm to elbow a Mewman who tried to attack him on his side, while the Mewman soldier fell backwards into another soldier. Kremar watched in horror as one of his best friends, a crab like monster named Charlie, was brutally beaten to death by a mace, while the others didn't seem to be faring so well. Kremar let out a huge scream, taking out a sword and slashing the maced Mewman who had committed this atrocity against his friend. Crying, he slashed behind him another Mewman, as he offered the only Monster resistance the Mewmans encountered.

Just as the fighting seemed to continue on, Lord Stanley Butterfly appeared on his huge Waricorn, heavily armoured. As Kremar approached him, he quickly slashed out his sword, but Lord Stanley kept dodging every lunge and thrust the muscular bird monster could handle.

Then, a sharp pain arose his chest. Kremar looked forward to see a huge sword impaled on his chest. Looking back, he had been so distracted by the Lord that he forgot to watch his back. Once the Mewman knight dislodged the sword from his chest, the great monster collapsed, not moving nor breathing as the Mewmans continued to charge towards the village.

**xxx**

As the Mewmans came closer and closer, young Ludo looked in fear. He quickly ran back to his wooden shack and gathered everything that he could. He was going to run away.

Ludo gathered some of his small toys to keep him occupied. It was going to be a very long journey he sense. He also stuffed a bag of grubs to eat in his large sack, while putting in a glass bottle of water, among many other things. He also took a small staff with bat-wings on it (something his father gave to him as a present) and put on his ox skull hat.

Ludo quickly found his mother, Ika in bed, sobbing. "C'mon Momma, we're getting outta here."

"No Ludo," sobbed Ika. "You go. I want to stay."

"I don't want to leave you behind!" cried the young Ludo.

"Son," said Ika as she cupped her son's face in his hands, "I have done everything I can in life. When I met your father, I knew that this was the man I wanted to be with. I have completed my destiny. You should worry about yourself. Fulfill your own destiny, meet new friends, and write your own story."

She kissed her son on the cheek and gave him one last hug, tears trickling down Ludo's face. "Goodbye, my son."

Ludo wiped away a tear as he ran the opposite direction where the Mewmans were approaching.

**xxx**

Ludo, after being several feet away from the village, dared himself to look back. The Mewmans went around, seemingly slashing every physical object with their swords. The Mewmans showed no mercy even to the villagers who didn't fight back. He saw what seemed to be fire emerging from some of the huts.

When he had gotten far enough that the Mewmans couldn't possibly hear them, Ludo let out a scream as he fell on both knees, feeling remorse, "NNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"

Everything young Ludo knew about his life was gone.

* * *

"You see, Marco," said the emotional Ludo, "The reason I wanted the wand for myself is so I can gain the freedom I lost all those years ago and get revenge on the people who killed my parents and my people. I began taking in many of those monsters, Man-Arm, Buff-Frog, and so on as my children. They too had parents who were causalities from the Mewman-Monster War."

"That's the first time you said my name." Marco was stunned. He always saw Ludo as the villain who wanted to mess with Star and him, but he never saw him as a grieving monster who was desperately at his wit's end. He began to feel sorry for Ludo.

"I'm sorry. Get some rest, you've had a very long day," said Marco, before shutting off the lights in his room.

Marco lay himself on the couch, trying to fall asleep. The thoughts from the day replayed in his head over and over. Of course, the monsters always provoked Star and him into fights, but were they right after all? Was he right to bring Ludo into his home? How did he see Star, now that he learnt more about the war?

It was 10:00 PM, and Marco Diaz still couldn't sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> From FF: Okay, there's something I want to bring up that I probably should have brought up before Chapter 1, and that's regarding this story's many similarities to Starfall by GolfAlphaMike. I have talked to GAM in the past, and credited him for inspiring this fanfiction. I foolishly forgot to add that little fact in Chapter 1, and therefore I deeply apologize. I will say that this fanfic did not intend to copy Starfall in any way, rather, a different take on a similar story.
> 
> Anyways, keep the questions coming: I'll do direct replies to logged in users as long as I find your comment interesting, and responses to guest reviews will end up on my Blogger. (The Canadian Infernape Show)


	3. Fixing the Shambles

 

 **The Dimension of Mewni**  
Outer Kingdom Town  
A day after the death of Queen Moon

A single scribe, guided by a knight who was valiantly riding through town on horseback, rode past many of the townspeople in the town market carelessly knocking over wagons of fruits, valuables, and other such products belonging to the merchants at the market. The horse came to a dead stop in the Town Square as the scribe dismounted, unraveling a scroll that was in the pouch, reading it aloud and very carefully.

"The Queen of Mewni has perished," shouted the scribe to the curious audience, "Funeral possessions are to occur at the swamp tomorrow at high noon. The coronation of Princess Star Butterfly is to take place in the next week."

Despite several tears being shed, many of the people weren't at all depressed about the passing of the Queen. Jeers erupted from the crowd of hundreds of townsfolk. A few of the dirty-looking townsfolk even held up wooden makeshift signs with unicorn blood plastered over them, reading "DOWN WITH BUTTERFLY", and "FEED OUR CHILDREN". The townfolk, many of them wearing rags for clothing began to charge at the scribe's horse, only for more Mewman knights led by Mewni General Wasp to form a blockade between the people and the Mewmans.

"Stop what you're doing," General Wasp yelled at the crowd of townspeople. "And we won't have to kill anyone today."

"WHY DON'T YOU DO SOMETHING FOR ONCE AND FEED US," shouted one of the townspeople, while a woman shouted from the crowd, "I HAVE TWENTY KIDS I HAVE TO FEED."

As the crowd kept pushing towards the scribe and the soldier, one of the merchants, possessing a white beard with rags for clothing, threw a tomato right at the mask of one of the knights. The knight, aghast at the red squashed tomato on his mask, wiped it away to have a look at the culprit.

Other merchants began throwing their fruits and vegetables at the armour-protected knights, while the knights braced for the onslaught of fruits with the many shields.

"THAT'S IT," shouted the aggressive general, "Don't say we didn't warn you."

Soon, the frightened townspeople began to retreat as the knights began slashing at the defenseless bodies in the crowd at random. Screams of horror rung out. The scribe and his knight remounted the horse and trotted back to the Butterfly Castle.

* * *

**The Dimension of Mewni  
Butterfly Castle**

"Yes. Yes. I'll speak to her right away," spoke the adviser to the scribe with the small enchanted hand-mirror. The Queen's adviser was a man in his 30s, with short raven hair. The man quickly stepped into the main hall, standing in the guarded presence of Queen Butterfly.

"Queen Butterfly," spoke the adviser, who took temporary seating on the throne. He began to deliver the news as discreetly as he could. "A mass riot broke out today after announcing the death of your mother. The knights counted that about twenty-two villagers perished during the riot."

"A riot," spoke Star, whose mouth slightly agape while touching her heart-shaped cheek. "I don't understand. How did it happen?"

The scribe turned towards the giant glass window that looked out towards and sighed heavily.

"Princ... er, I mean, Queen Butterfly. Are you not aware of the current state of the Butterfly Kingdom?"

"My mother literally told me not to leave the kingdom for the past few years," replied Star, using a sharp tone in her voice. "She used to order me to stay in the castle to study on the history of Mewni. At least, when she wasn't sick."

The blonde princess paused for a second, then continued sarcastically, "Now I am bound to sit in this throne for the next few hours, definitely having the most exciting moments of my life. That good enough for you?"

The scribe put a hand to his head and sighed yet again. "Look, I am fully aware of how boring the job can be. It's not easy for someone who's just lost her mother, and expected to sit in a chair and not expected to cry or show emotion all da-"

"What a little misogynist you are," gagged Star, rolling her eyes, hand slouched in a bored position on the throne.

"Ugh, pardon me, your Majesty. I didn't mean it that w- Anyways." the adviser spoke, trying not to lose train of thought, "I should give you an update on what's happened in current events, since all the book-reading probably didn't cover it."

The black-haired man turned away from the Queen yet again and began speaking. "The citizens of Mewni are at their wits' ends. They have been demanding democratic reforms to free them from the monarchy of the Butterfly Kingdom."

Star recalled that term when she took Politics in her senior year of high school on Earth.

 _Democratic reforms_ , she thought, _but why break a centuries old tradition?_

"I see," stated Queen Butterfly, musing at the adviser. "Why are they rebelling?"

"Your majesty," spoke the adviser with a hint of tameness in his eyes, "I don't believe I should be the one to bring this up, but it's now or never anyways. Queen Butterfly, the entire state of the kingdom has been in shambles since you left for Earth."

Star was stunned. "What did my parents do?"

"Just before you left Mewni, your parents realized many of the castle funds were short. It was mostly owed debt from other kingdoms like Uni, y'know," said the adviser. "They decided not to cut the high taxes as promised but make them even higher to save themselves. The people became more impoverished day after day. The people demanded lower taxes to feed their families. They decided to send you to Earth not only because of the wand incident, but also to learn to rule with a firmer hand. The Earth dimension was rumoured to have some of the galaxy's best leaders. The Earthlings knew how to run a system better than some of the nobles here at Mewni. The royals hoped their own daughter could pick these systems up on Earth. You would've definitely been sent to St. Olga's hadn't this idea pitched in."

This revelation had not helped Star, who seemed at least ten times as petrified as before. Before her emotional psyche could run haywire, her blonde bearded father arrived in the royal chambers. Beside the old wrinkly senior was a tall young man with elegant blonde hair and blue eyes. The adviser gave the Queen and her father a quick nod of respect before walking out of the royal court.

"Hello, my beautiful daughter," spoke Star's father, gawking at the taller man. "I'd like you to meet _this_ breath of fresh air. Prince Dragonfly of the Zoomi Dimension!"

The queen had been dazzled by the muscular man in front of him. Prince Dragonfly stood in front of the queen, taking her hand and looking valiantly into her glimmering blue eyes. "Princess Butterfly, I feel honoured to be in your presence."

Star was awed by the man's stunning looks. She forgot everything around her and observed patiently for her own response, but not a sound left her lips. Her lust-driven euphoria began to fade back into reality and the Queen began to shift back into focus.

"The honour is mine, Prince Dragonfly," spoke Star, who was getting into a more serious of postures atop her throne. "What brings you to Mewni?"

"I believe you should know the reason, m'lady," the prince spoke, taking his hand to hers. "I was appointed by your lovely father as a lovely suitor to your father."

The Butterfly Queen began to blush uncontrollably. Star found herself sinking lower and lower in her throne every passing second her hand was enveloped in the Prince's hand. As his hand pulled away from hers, the tension finally relaxed. King River stepped forward.

"Well then," said River, stepping away. "We can start all the relationship building tomorrow. I must show the Prince around the kingdom."

River quickly stepped away from the royal chamber, talking rather casually to the prince as he headed out. Star slumped in her chair, questioning her own behaviour. She wondered what had just conspired.

* * *

**Nightfall**

Star was lying in the royal bed, unable to sleep. She thought about Prince Dragonfly and how his look satisfied her in some way. For some reason, she kept feeling an irresistible aura when she had been around him. She always feeling the urge to hold his hand and always risked small glances across the feasting table during dinner. She lusted over this man.

Simultaneously, her thoughts were often muddled by her adviser's words.

_"They decided to send you to Earth not only because of the wand incident, but also to learn to rule with a firmer hand."_

Deciding she couldn't sleep, Star lifted the mahogany covers off of herself and lifted her body until she was sitting up. These thoughts swarmed her. Did years of tradition from the Butterfly lineage finally begin showing its cracks?

"I need to freaking do something!" groaned Star, who was finally standing. She tiptoed quietly to the main hall, watching from the upper floor, eavesdropping in the main hall below where two guards stood watch. Queen Star had never been fond of the two guards, and they had a very opposing political view as opposed to the ruling Butterfly monarchy. As usual, most of their nightly complaints were about the kingdom's position.

One of the guards was a tall man with jet-black hair known as Steve. "To be honest, y'know what was the worst thing that happened to this kingdom?"

The other guard, Jon, who was chubbier and smaller, chuckled before asking. "What?"

"The worst thing was the death of Queen Moon. I mean, at least she didn't have twenty-two villagers' blood on her hands."

Both of them let out a light chuckle as they looked outside of the castle.

"Boy," said Jon with a sadistic smirk on his face, "The Butterfly Kingdom is really gonna go downhill. Now we have Star as our Queen. That girl is crazy."

"Don't get me started on her," Steve hollered with mock fear, "I remember the day she got the royal magic wand from her parents. She almost burnt down the whole kingdom the first time she used it. I almost got run over by the unicorn she was riding on that day."

"Forget the twenty-five hundred men we just enrolled last year, we have trouble hiring a _babysitter._ "

The two men burst out in laughter, but Star had heard enough as her rage began to consume her. She slowly took out her wand and was prepared to blast the two guards.

 _Don't do something that isn't worth it,_ Marco Diaz's words echoed in Star's head as she placed the wand down. She sighed when she thought of that Earth boy. A tear ran down her eye as she quickly wiped it away. Often thinking about her past on Earth made her tear up and cherish what she missed on Earth. The Diazs and their generosity. Echo Creek and the small community.

 _Marco._ That name was the one that depressed her the most. She knew she missed him terribly as everyone else she had met on Earth, but _he_ was different. _He_ was the one link between her and everyone else. _He_ always looked after her in times of pain and sorrow and always helping her up during the fights between Ludo and his monster army. She never had someone who she could depend on so tightly, someone who was willing to listen and reply to all of her own troubles with the Earth dimension. Marco Diaz was the person she missed the most.

Star silently walked back to her room pacing to the front balcony out-looking the entire mansion. Leaning on the balustrade of the balcony, the Queen looked up to see a full moon, barely covered by the nightly clouds. Star looked down to see her arm begin to glow a bright blue colour. Rolling up her dress sleeve, she could see her tattoo-like mark intensified under the moonlight

The mark had calligraphic heart-shape on it. Inside the heart-shape was a mystical looking eye which often flipped from open to closed during times in the day. It was wide open right now.

 _Oh yeah_ , Star thought aloud. _I remember that mark from after the events of that night so long ago..._


	4. AFTER THE NIGHT OF DANCING

**Echo Creek, CA  
Diaz Household**   
**8 years ago**

Exiting the chariot carried by the red winged gargoyle, a solitary bell noise rung as the doors opened to reveal Marco and Star, the former dressed in a Day of the Dead attire with a mask and sombrero on as well, while Star had her hair tied back in a small bun while wearing a puffy, light-pink dress.

"Thanks for the lift." Star called out to the gargoyle above as she stomped down from the chariot footbridge and onto the stone porch of her room.

"So infuriating." the girl muttered furiously. Marco quickly followed suit and slid off the chariot footbridge as it retracted for the gargoyle to move the chariot below the Earth's surface once again.

"I hate to break it to you, but I warned you about Tom," Marco blurted out with a tone of arrogance.

Star, who was heading back into the house to get changed, quickly stopped at this comment and turned back towards Marco.

"No!" she shrieked, tossing her white dress gloves at Marco. "YOU! You're infuriating!"

The gloves sailed past the porch as Marco stood, stunned at what he was hearing. "Me? I was just trying to hel-"

"You don't trust me to do things by myself!" Star yelled at her best friend. Her emotions took the better of her. "I'm fourteen! I can handle a demon."

The princess walked to the edge of the porch as she glumly looked from something afar. Marco looked at her from behind his mask, still confused about why she was acting the way she was. Star noticed the eyes of her friend were drooping, as the fire inside of her extinguished.

"I know you're trying to look out for me," Star said sympathetically in the matter, but you have to let me figure things out on my own. I don't need a hero. I need a friend."

Star was still gazing from the porch as Marco approached her and took a seat on the porch. Removing his mask from his face, he sighed as he finally remorsed, "You're right. I should've trusted you. I'm sorry I ruined your night."

"Well, it wasn't a total disaster..." Star looked back at Marco for a second, removed the sombrero from his head and put it on hers. "...now I know you can dance."

She gave out a quick smirk as the two of them stared at each other, with their eyes averted to the top of Marco's now-exposed hair.

"Hahaha! Hat hair!" Star and Marco spoke almost in perfect unison. Surprised by each other's actions, they began to point at each other, amused by each other's gaze.

"Woah," they both kept speaking, "We both said... the same thing... Okay, stop that."

Star gasped as they even covered their own mouths in unison. She began to hold her wand in a defensive position as she held her breath for a while, but eventually, the two teenagers let it out of their system as they chuckled about the small occurrence that had just conspired.

"Well that was new." Star said as the laughter between the two subsided.

"Yeah," replied Marco, "weird."

"Now go make me some nachos," Star demanded in mock furiosity.

"Okay," said Marco, as he went back into the house to make his best friend a well deserved snack.

* * *

Marco came back a while later, still dressed in his uniform, holding a huge plate of steamy cheese nachos. "Did someone order a plate of steamy cheese nachos?!"

Star was excited by the sudden sight of the food in front of her. "Ooh, thanks Marco!"

Marco set the plate of nachos down on the stone porch as Star began to take a handful of nachos and began to stuff it in her face. Marco took a few in his hand and began to chow down.

When Marco downed his first bite, he began to speak again. "Wow, they taste better than the last time I cooked these!"

"Agreed," Star said again, but her voice was met by Marco's voice saying the exact word. The two both flinched, and Marco covered his mouth, obviously not expecting both of their words to be blurted out at the same time.

Bursting out laughing, Star said, "Wow, is this just a coincidence or what?"

"I know right," said Marco, "I didn't expect that!"

Star and Marco pondered in a bit of silence for a while, taking some time to think about what happened during the event.

"Say," spoke Marco, "what do you think he meant?"

"Who," asked Star, caught slightly off guard by Marco's question.

"That ball leader," replied Marco, "I mean, he did say something about what happens when 'two lucky souls' are picked by the Blood Moon's light. But wasn't there some other part about _binding two souls together for eternity_? We were chosen. What happens now?"

"I don't know Marco," Star spoke as she swallowed yet another handful of nachos. "I've heard stories about the Blood Moon and many people say that it's just a myth used to make the event more romantic, but I heard something magical happened to the last couple chosen by the blood moon all those years ago."

"Oh," replied Marco. Marco stared at his friend's body and yet again looked at her puffy pink dress. Marco couldn't stop blushing at her. He kept looking at Star while she looked out of the porch, stuffing her face with the occasional nachos. He quickly shook himself out of his trance, realizing how stupid he was acting.

"Marco," said Star, who was looking down, partially guilty, "Do you really not trust me?"

"Hm?"

Star looked towards her friend with eyes. Emotionally spent, the princess looked at Marco with a small tone of sadness. "I don't know. I feel like I've messed up countless times since I've been here on Earth, and now, I'm wondering if you even trust me to do the right thing. I'm not even sure if I could handle Tom."

She continued babbling on for more. "Sometimes I say things that make me seem capable. I _want_ to be capable. In reality, I don't even know what could've have happened if you hadn't showed up."

Marco approached Star and looked into her eyes. "Star. I understand. I shouldn't have stepped in if you didn't want me to, but I was really worried about you. You have been really covering my back lately, and I felt it was just as right that I had yours. You're more important to me than you ever imagined. I don't want to lose you."

Star beamed at Marco's comment and gave him a light smile. She then quickly pounced on him and put him into a light hug. Marco raised his arms, accepting the hug.

"Thank you."

Backing off from the hug, Marco and Star quickly took the last handfuls of nachos from the plate. They easily stuffed it in their mouths and swallowed.

"Wow. That was delicious!" said the two of them.

Star and Marco jumped, realizing they had copied each other yet again. They quickly laughed it out, both of them laughing until it was out of their system. The two of them needed it after all, as a kind of treatment from the overly-dramatic night they had just encountered.

"Wonder if this is part of the soul-binding thing." Marco chuckled.

"Well, it's getting late. I should be off to bed," replied Star, who entered the spade-shaped door-frame. "Good night, Marco."

"Good night, Star."

As Star stepped down the long stairs, Marco stayed on the porch, looking up to the shining red moon from above.

 _"Well done Marco... The prophecy will begin to take cycle..."_ the mysterious voice from Marco's head called out again. Marco looked around, identifying what sound made the noise. He shrugged as he headed back inside for sleep.

* * *

_**The next morning...** _

Marco woke up to the painful ringing of his alarm in the morning. The biggest problem with last night's Blood Moon Ball was that it happened on a school night. Marco and Star still had to get ready for school the next morning, leaving Marco exhausted by the late-night ordeal. He sat up on his bed, and routinely dressed into his normal attire. Blue skinny jeans, check. White shirt, check. Red hoodie, check.

After getting dressed, the boy headed downstairs when he ran into Star, who was already pouring herself a bowl of Froot Loops at the table. "Mornin' Marco."

"Good morning, Star." grumbled Marco tiredly as he grabbed a cereal bowl from the cabinet and took a seat at the dining room table.

As he poured cereal and milk into the bowl, Star and Marco turned to each other and said, "So, what do you wanna do after school today?"

Caught by surprise by their speaking in perfect unison, both of them flinched. Star almost fell out of her chair.

"Okay, that was funny yesterday, but now it's getting old. Cut it out!" the two spoke in utter unison yet again. Both of them began to get extremely agitated at each other.

"STOP," the pair both screamed on top of their lungs.

"Why are you thinking about saying everything I'm thinking? How is this even possible?" The two were beginning to freak out as they looked at each other in mere confusion.

"JUST STOP COPYING ME," they both said together, again the quote starting and ending in unison.

 _Okay,_ Marco thought, unaware Star was thinking the exact same thing, _Maybe if I say something completely random and out of nowhere, I will get 'em to stop copying me._

Star and Marco turned to each other until they were face to face, so close their noses were almost touching. Breathing in, they both let it out.

"LUDO IS THE BIGGEST MEANIE IN THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE!" Both of them had their mouths wide open, unsure about how to take this in. They slouched back into their chairs, looking away from each other for a second.

They turned to each other again and blurted out a random phrase in perfect unison, several times, actually.

"MEOW! WHAT THE-"

"SPACE UNICORN, SOARING THROUGH THE STARS... WOOOOWWW!"

"SUPER-CALI-FRAG-I-LIST-IC-EX-PI-AL-I-DO-CIOUS... JEEZ!"

As they turned away from each other for yet another time, the two were getting increasingly flustered as the predicament wore on.

The duo spoke, "Okay, maybe if we say each other's names by ourselves the copying thing won't work."

"STAR! MARCO!" Star and Marco blurted out, yet again, in impeccable timing. "NO, NOT LIKE THAT, SAY MY NAME BY YOURSELF! DON'T SAY YOUR OWN NAME."

Eventually, both teenagers gave up as they slung their backpacks on their shoulders as they headed out of the house to go to school.

"Maybe this thing will end when we get to school."

The two of them sat on the bus in silence all the way to school.

* * *

**Echo Creek Academy**

The first class of the day was Mathematics with the troll teacher, Ms. Skullnick, who was in an especially crabby mood. Star and Marco, who sat next to each other in that class, gave each other a small glare.

"Alright class," said Ms. Skullnick. "Today's a very special day! This day marks the FIFTY day anniversary of me being a troll, thanks to a significant individual in this room," The teacher glared at the blonde haired princess when she said the words _'significant individual'_. "Therefore, I feel it's necessary that we celebrate this momentous occasion!"

The class erupted in cheers. They were slightly thank thankfully, a bit surprised at the news.

"...with the WORST pop quiz in your life!" snickered the math teacher, to which the class groaned in disappointment.

As she handed out the papers to each successive student in the classroom, Ms. Skullnick said, "Don't give me that attitude, class. It's just basic algebra. Anyone with a brain cell could figure this out. Oh wait, I forgot, this class has the LEAST combined brain cells of any class I've ever had! Now get to work!"

Star sunk in her chair at the nervousness of the test. She had just begun to get used to the tests in math, partially thanks to Marco's tutoring, but she began to wonder if the tutoring had paid off. It didn't help that, when Skullnick gave her the test paper, she thrusted it down onto Star's desk so hard that Star thought the teacher would crack the desk into two.

Star sweated as she read the instruction on the top of the paper.

* * *

_Simplify each of the following expressions. Show ALL of your work. Any quiz grade under 60% will receive double homework for the next week. I mean it._

**#1:** -6x + 5 + 12x - 6

 **#2:** 2(x - 9) + 6(-x + 2) + 4x

* * *

Star gulped, as she read the last two sentences. She definitely didn't want more homework than usual. She began nibbling on her pencil. Looking over at Marco he could see him confidently writing down the paper and burning through each of the seven questions. Star began to hear a little voice from inside of her head, which shared an uncanny resemblence to the voice of the boy sitting next to her, Marco Diaz.

 _"Okay, take the 6x and arrange it behind the 12x then group the common factors together... You got it Marco..."_ spoke the voice in her head.

The princess looked over at Marco. His mouth wasn't moving and it didn't look like he said anything.

Immediately Star began scribbling down almost automatically on the test paper. When she looked back at it, she gasped;

* * *

 **#1:** -6x + 5 + 12x - 6

**_= 12x - 6x + 5 - 6_ **   
**_= 6x - 1_ **

* * *

Star had never thought about any aspect of the question, but this was the most coherent answer that she ever wrote down during any Math test she wrote in general. Even with the tutoring from Marco, she was surprised that she could have written something this sensible with completed work shown on a math test. She took the answer she came up with and was thoroughly accepting of what she wrote down.

Though the voice still boomed in her head, Star successfully finished the rest of the questions in the allotted time.

"Done," Star gasped, holding her paper forward, a full minute before the end of the given time. She didn't look until she saw Marco to the right of her, who had also said the same thing she said, and was also handing in the paper at the _exact same time._

As she retook her seat, from the corner of her eye she spotted Marco eyeing her with a deep suspicion. All Star did was put on a wide grin and turn away.

"Alright class," Ms. Skullnick yelped out with a shrill tone, "I want you all to shut your pie-holes and look through page three hundred sixty-seven in the textbook. I will be marking your quizzes to prove what utter failures you are."

Everyone scrambled to their textbooks, not wanting to upset their green-skinned troll teacher. As Star glanced from her textbook, she saw her teacher marking one of the tests. The teacher went from casually marking the test, but at one of the tests, she suddenly looked at it with wide open eyes and inspected it further. Ms. Skullnick looked over the test repeatedly, but ended up marking it and putting it in within the pile of marked tests.

A few minutes later, Miss Skullnick passed the tests along the class, where she babbled yet another insulting phrase to the students.

"Alright class," the teacher spoke, "As usual, most of you did crap, so if you got less than five out of a possible seven marks, EXTRA HOMEWORK."

When the troll teacher got to Star, she slammed the test paper onto her desk with her giant green hand. Star looked at the test paper and gasped.

A huge _A+_ circled in red showed on the paper. Star had gotten every question right.

"What's the trick, Miss Butterfly," Miss Skullnick yelped, "You didn't perhaps use witchery, or some kind of magic cheating device from your petty little dimension, did you!? Did you cheat from that Diaz kid?! TELL ME!"

"No, madam," Star smiled, lost in the delusion of her recent success. Ms. Skullnick walked away, muttering inaudibly. Marco looked at the paper. His eyes widened upon seeing the grade. He looked over at Star, who was smiling and slightly drooling.

"Star, how did you," the boy said. He then noticed that the voice copying had stopped. "HEY! I'M NOT COPYING YOU ANYMORE!"

Star woke up, and said, "YOU'RE RIGHT! HALLELUJAH!"

The two friends exchanged a high-five just as the bell rung.

* * *

"So... care to tell me how you get an _A+_ on that test?"

It was lunchtime, and Marco and Star had just gotten out of their second period classes. They were sitting together on a green lunch table in the highly audible school cafeteria. "I don't recall getting to the bracketed algebra equations during tutoring. Did you figure it out by yourself?"

"Um..." Star replied awkwardly, not knowing whether or not to tell the truth.

"C'mon Star," Marco said, giving her a light elbow in the arm. "I promise I won't tell anyone even if you were cheating on my test. I'm just surprised, that's all."

Seeing as though she could trust Marco, she decided to come clean. "I heard some weird voice in my head that sounded an awfully lot like yours. I just followed what the voice told me to do. Your tutoring helped me too."

"That's funny," Marco thought out loud, "because I heard a humming voice in my head that sounded an awfully lot like _yours_. It was distracting me during the test."

Star blushed and immediately looked at Marco, her mouth agape, "You don't think this has something to do with the ball last night, do you?"

"OH NO," the two blurted out. Both of them realized what had just come out of their mouths. "AW DAMMI-"

* * *

After school, the two teenagers burst into Star's bedroom as Star quickly pulled out her huge brown book of spells from under her bed.

"THIS HAS TO STOP, NOW." Star and Marco screamed at each other in perfect rhythmic pacing. Flipping through the book, Star flipped into the small blue genie who was taking a nap in levitation.

"WAKE UP!"

Glossaryck shook awake, then glanced up at the two hysterical and irritated teenagers who were staring right down at him. "Man, is it really that hard to get a simple 'please wake up'? Anyways, if it's so important, what is it?"

The two pressured the small blue genie as he figuratively shrunk in size. "Fix. This. NOW."

At the comment, Glossaryck was dying in laughter. "You really came to me for this? I mean, are you two joking? Your souls are bonded together. You have to probably go out on a date with each other..."

Marco and Star looked at each other in pure horror. "NO! I STILL HAVE TO GO ON A DATE WITH JAC-OSKAR!"

The genie winced. "Jacoskar? What kind of a name is Jacoskar? If you're going on a date with that person, can you ask him why his parents named him Jacoskar for me?"

Continuing on, the genie continued his long lecture. "I was joking about the date thing anyways; soul bonding doesn't control independent actions unless afflicted by a spell. The point however is... magic can't reverse bonded souls. They're stuck together for eternity. You two happen to be under the _Mimicking Spell_ , one of the side-effects of soul-bonding."

The two teenagers looked to each other in shock. "But why did the spell stop after a while?"

The genie observed them both closely, then spoke on, "Bonding is a tedious process; the bonding usually takes a couple of hours to fully complete. The mimicking spell can relapse several times at any given moment until, well, the bonding is complete. If the side effects of the bonding aren't removed, you two will forever mimic each other's words and keep the side-effects for the rrrrest of your lives."

That certainly didn't help the mood of the two teenagers. "HOWDOWEFIXIT? HOWDOWEFIXIT? HOWDOWEFIXIT? HOWDOWEFIXIT?" They were literally grabbing Glossaryck in an awkward choke hold position. He politely put his hands up, prompting the teens to yield.

"Unfortunately, there's no possible way to break the soul-bond, but you can reduce or eliminate the side-effects. However, it's magic from the Underworld. Only people from there can undo such a spell."

As both of their mouths stayed wide open, Glossaryck began to lie down in the air while putting on a blindfold. "Well, that's enough for me, g'luck finding a demon to reverse the spells. Ta-ta!" The book slammed shut and magically hovered under Star's bed.

The spell had seemed to magically reverse for the meanwhile.

"I'm not going back to the Underworld." Star said flatly. "Not after last night. Tom will kill us if he's thawed already!"

"Star, it's probably our only way to reverse this spell, unless you have a better alternative."

* * *

Unknown to the two teenagers, outside of the Diaz house, a beam of fire emerged from the bottom of the earth, forming a huge crevasse on the adjacent roadway. Emerging from the ensuing blast was a muscular man that seemed to be in his late fifties, with wrinkly skin and orderly grey hair tucked underneath a coonskin hat. He possessed short grey hairs protruding around his chin. He was wearing a black trench-coat on with a pair of black dress pants. The man quickly observed the house in front of him. He noticed the castle loft protruding from the right end of the house. Upon seeing this, his grin was wide.

"Ah yes," the man chuckled with a heavy Russian accent. "I have finally found ze house of de two bonded soul-mates."

* * *

"Star, we're gonna have to go back to the Underworld sooner or later." Marco explained, holding the Dimensional Scissors in his one hand while dragging the princess across the living room floor with his other hand. "I don't want to be stuck with the Mimicking Spell forever."

"I'm not going back there, Marco!" Star bawled, lying on the floor as Marco was dragging her, "That's the second worst place I want to go back to other than St. Olgaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa's!"

Just then, the front door of the Diaz's house was blown to smithereens by a fiery blast. A grey-haired man emerged from the blast, his hands enveloped in orange fumes.

Star and Marco looked at the man, shocked at the sight they just saw. The spell came back as the two screamed together. Star and Marco could care less.

As the man approached, Star held out her wand in self-defence, while Marco's parents emerged from the kitchen. Mrs. Diaz's had both hands on her cheeks in horror at the man approaching them. Mr. Diaz, who was also wearing his chef's hat, had a spatula in hand.

"BACK OFF FROM MY KIDS, STRANGER." Mr. Diaz said defensively. "I HAVE A SPATULA AND I'M NOT AFRAID..."

The grey-haired man unfeelingly looked back at the two concerned parents as he snapped his fingers. Both of their parents froze in place. The scenery seemed to freeze along with the parents. Star and Marco were shocked as they were the only ones who didn't seem frozen.

"But..." muttered both teens in harmony, "that's a Freeze Spell. How did you use it?"

"I think we got off on de wrong foot," the man spoke in his heavy Russian accent. "My name's Molotov. Orcus Molotov. I'm from the underworld."

He looked directly at the two of them. "I wanted to meet you two after the dance last night, but you two took off before I could say a thing. I've been looking for you since."

"Can you fix the spell," Star and Marco begged, falling on their knees for the muscular Russian man. "It's SOOOOOO annoying."

"Ya, ya. Sure." spoke Molotov, holding up a finger as it turned a fiery orange colour. "I do warn you though, this may hurt a bit."

Lowering the orange finger, he took Star's arm, and pressed the finger down onto it. Star screamed when she saw smoke emerge from the finger, as the searing pain emerged. Molotov steadily lifted his fiery finger. He did the same to Marco's, who winced and tried to hold it back the feeling of his skin burning. When Molotov was finished, Star and Marco clutched the burn marks on their arm to find minuscule red calligraphic hearts printed on their skin. Both marks had an eye on it. The two of them let out a cheer upon realizing the Mimicking Spell had finally diminished.

"The marks counter all the spells related to the bonding, and they're also there to make sure you don't forget you're bonded." Molotov explained. "This is the only favour I'm doing for you guys. I will forgive, but I won't forget what you did to my nephew."

"Nephew?" repeated Star, looking over at Marco. "Who was your nephew?"

"Thomas," Molotov explained looking down to the crouched teenagers. "He's the son of my elder brother, Lucifer."

"TOM," Marco yelped.

"Yes, I saw you freeze him in a block of ice. Do you have any idea how long it took to thaw the damn ice out?" spoke Molotov, "Anyways, I don't even care that you stole his dance. The Blood Moon knew what it was doing when it chose you two."

"I don't mean to be rude," noticed Marco, who was now standing on two feet. "but if you're Tom's uncle, you're supposed to be a devil, right?"

"Don't let my looks fool you, kid." Molotov said, "I'm reincarnated as a human so I don't scare people. You honestly don't want to see my _true_ form."

Marco quickly began to back off as Molotov made his way to the front door. Just before he headed out, he stopped and turn back to them again.

"Almost forgot. I am also here to deliver the _Blood Moon's Prophecy._ "

"What?" Marco asked.

"The prophecy that entitles a message of the future to the bond of lovers."

Marco blushed at the word _lovers_ , but Star paid no attention, instead seeming amazed by the words of the wise devil man. "The future..."

Molotov began to hover telepathically. As he closed his eyes, his entire body burst into flames. Still with his eyes closed, the devil recited the following words in a clearer accent;

_Alas, the moon has chosen, at the turn of the night,_   
_The moon of lovers has done its good deed,_   
_But bonded souls beware, not all will be bright,_   
_At the final challenge, the bond will draw 'part._

The fire subsided as the devil descended from the air, his eyes opening at last.

"Wait." Star cut in. "What do you mean, _'the bond will draw apart?'_ "

Molotov shrugged his shoulders. "I dunno. I'm just the messenger."

The old devil walked past the broken door-frame, but not before he snapped his fingers yet again.

Time began to flow back instantly, as Mr. Diaz waved his spatula right at where Molotov had been standing.

"...NOT AFRAID TO USE... woah, wasn't there just a big old man there a second ago?"

"Nope." Marco replied. "You've just gone insane, Dad."

Mr. Diaz face-palmed as he headed back to the kitchen. "I'm booking another appointment with the psychologist, honey."

Mrs. Diaz turned around to see the shattered remains of the front door. "What on earth happened to the door?"

Marco and Star sat down on the living-room floor.

"No idea, Mom." Marco said.

Star wasn't listening to anything. Instead, her focus was on the heart-shaped mark burnt onto her skin.

* * *

**8 years later**

Queen Star was still looking at the bond mark.

Staring out at the blue moon from her balcony, the Queen began to wonder if the four years away from Marco would finally make the prophecy draw true.

"Is this what Molotov meant all those years ago?"


	5. Explorer

**Marco's Apartment**   
**Echo Creek, CA**

Marco lay on the couch, still fast asleep. He then heard a small deep voice in the head.

_"...But bonded souls beware, not all will be bright. At the final challenge, the bond will draw 'part."_

Marco woke up with a start. He quickly snuck a peek at the clock on his smartphone.

6:50 AM. Marco's eyes went wide. He knew he wouldn't get to work at this rate.

Marco dashed to the small kitchen for a quick breakfast. He found some cereal in the wooden cabinet above the stove. Haphazardly pouring cereal into a bowl that he had arranged himself, he juggled the cereal along while grabbing a milk carton from the fridge in his other hand and dunked the milk into the sloppily poured cereal bowl. The milk somehow overflowed and ended up splattering all over the kitchen room tile. Marco voted to clean it up later.

Carrying the cereal to the living room coffee table, the phone on his table rumbled once. Marco picked the phone up to read the text he had just received. It was from Mr. James Martin.

_Hi Marco, sorry for waking you up early. Rise and shine, eh? Embarrassingly enough, I forgot that I had an interview today with the local news station **The Echo** in Los Angeles at 7 AM today. Therefore I'd like you to show up to the main building at 9. If you're interested, you can watch the interview on TV if you'd like. Hope to see you this morning!  
_ _\- JM_

Marco slumped on the couch, finally relaxing from the morning rush. He turned on the TV with the remote with perfect timing. The blonde anchorwoman's face showed on the screen.

"This is Tammy, and we're live again here at The Echo at 6," the blonde anchorwoman spoke, rather excitedly on the TV. Marco questioned how this woman was even able to stay wide awake and excited at the same time. He suspected coffee had a lot to do with it.

* * *

**EchoNews Station**

"Today, we have a very special guest with us today," Tammy said. "I'm giving you one of the richest CEOs in the country, head of the rising Explorer Corporation, Mr. James Martin!"

She turned her attention as the camera panned away from the newsdesk. From behind the stage, the long raven haired CEO emerged. Wearing a fresh, newly-washed tuxedo, he casually strode over to the newsdesk. He eagerly shook hands with the blonde woman as he took the vacant seat just next to her.

"Pleasure to have you on the show James. How are you today?"

"Great, the pleasure's all mine," spoke Martin, who took a sip of the plastic cup of coffee he was drinking.

"I have to admit, out of all the famous celebrities we've had on this show, I think you're the best looking celeb we've had on this show, especially in the morning."

"Ooooh, really?" James said with a seductive tone. Both interviewer and interviewee laughed at the interviewee's little joke.

"Alright, as much as I would like to keep telling jokes," Tammy began, "I have to start asking some questions..."

* * *

**Marco's Apartment**

Marco was disinterested with the interview on the television. Aside from his own fatigue which drained him on this particular morning, he found the questions in the interview rather dull. The interviewee was just asking questions about the basics of the company. Fair enough, the company was not well known. But something about the blonde anchorwoman ticked him off. Her blonde hair. The cheery voice. It was all coming back to him now.

Picking up his cereal bowl, Marco arose from the couch and began pacing back and forth around his living room, trying to get the thoughts of his past out of his head. Just then, he heard a coughing sound from his bedroom. Oh yeah, Ludo was still around.

Marco opened the door to find the kappa monster coughing and wheezing as he awoke on Marco's bed. The monster tilted his head to face the human.

"G'morning, Marco." Ludo wheezed. "Man, I haven't gotten this much sleep in forever!"

"Good morning Ludo." Marco said, glancing at the small monster. "I'm betting you slept well."

"I usually never stay asleep for too long nowadays." Ludo said. "Especially with all the nightmares I get in my sleep."

"What kind of nightmares?" Marco asked.

"Nothing. Just things from my past." Ludo spoke, diverting the conversation elsewhere. "Thanks for the bed, anyways."

"Hey, no problem." Marco said confidently, looking towards the small grey monster. "I have to go to work soon, so..."

"I know, I know." Ludo sounded teary now. "You want me to leave."

"No, no, no... not at all, Ludo. I just meant, um..., I mean, you can stay if you'd like but, um, I was just worried about what you're going to do when I'm gone. I can't watch you, and I'm not sure you have a good grasp on Earth culture to find your way around."

"I can handle it. I mean, I'm not Star, right?"

"Alright," Marco said, "I gotta get ready for work. I'll see you around, okay?"

Heading out of the room, Marco felt a sudden mass of weight attached to his back, like a backpack or something. Looking back, he saw the kappa tightly wrapped around his back, tears streaming down his face. Of all the years he spent fighting him and his army with Star, Marco had never seen the monster so emotional. He looked like a puppy from an animal shelter who was finally getting adopted.

"T-t-thank you." Ludo wailed. He then changed his attitude to a sterner one. "Don't tell anyone I did that, okay?"

Marco giggled as he walked out of the bedroom. "Cross my heart, Ludo."

Marco walked back to the coffee table in the living room, where he noticed the TV was still blaring loudly with James's interview still on air. Scooping the last few flakes of cereal from the bowl, he continued to watch as the long-haired CEO spoke to the blonde anchorwoman, Tammy.

"...and to finish off," spoke Tammy, looking right at a confident James Martin, "this last question is something I think many of your supporters in the finance world wants to know: What is your main, sorta, philosophy, or something that you personally believe in when you run Explorer?"

"Magic." James spoke nonchalantly with a slight aura of confidence. "I believe in magic."

Tammy's jaw dropped slowly, as did Marco, who was watching the interview. The CEO just burst out laughing.

"My, I sounded psychotic there for a second, didn't I?" laughed James. "I'm not crazy, rest assured to all of the people watching this morning. But lemme explain: I'm not sure if you remember this, but do you remember that story in local L.A. news? It wasn't front page news or anything but... There was something the papers picked up as a _'magical princess from another dimension'_. Like, someone like that was living in this very city."

Marco almost spit out the milk he gulped from the cereal. Did the CEO really know about Princess Star Butterfly of Mewni? Tammy looked just as shocked as he did.

"Yeah." Tammy said, eyes still wide open. "I remember something like that a couple of years ago. She moved back to her own dimension four years ago, according to the family that hosted her. Carry on."

Nothing could stop the CEO now. He burst out laughing as he tried to stay calm on the air. When he finally calmed, he continued telling his story. "Apparently the claim was that this girl had magical powers. Like, she had this wand that could produce narwhals at her own command! Some witchcraft, eh? Anyways, what really got me interested in this story is what happened when a group of scientists from Echo Creek College tried to prove the magic as 'false' and that it was just a hoax."

"What happened to them exactly?" asked the shocked Tammy.

"The scientists eventually gave up. They just couldn't prove it. The team said it was legitimate 100% magic from this other dimension that couldn't be explained through means of science."

The CEO paused with a sigh. Continuing, Martin spoke, "Humans often tend to break everything down into the smallest and most understandable common denominator. We crave a scientifically-based answer to everything. Every little question that challenges us here on Earth. Ever since I heard about this story and the research that went into it, I've noticed that not everything is possible. There's millions of discoveries waiting to be taken advantage of. We get to discover new things even outside our boundaries. That's pretty much all I have to say regarding my philosophy."

Tammy stroked her blonde hair for a second, wide-eyed at what the CEO just said. "Okay. That's all for today, thank you for spending time with us, Mr. Martin."

Marco shut off the TV. He began to take in the interview, questioning what Mr. Martin was saying. At the same time he was curious at viewing his new workspace at the same time.

* * *

**_Explorer Corporation_ Headquarters**

Marco arrived an entire half-hour early to the place, walking through the revolving doors. The building, which he had seen the day before, had orderly dark-marble tiling scattered along the floor, along with white wallpapered floors. Looking up, Marco saw the long dark-haired man standing at the receptionist's desk.

"Marco, m'boy!" James cheered, greeting him with a pat on the back. "You're early! Wait here, the employee should be here any second now."

Just as James had finished, two steel elevator doors behind them slid apart. Marco looked. He saw another man about Marco's age approach them, and he seemed to be just about Marco's size. Short black-hair. Huge-framed glasses. He was wearing a white lab suit. Marco quickly observed back and forth between the two men, noticing an uncanny resemblance between the two of them. James looked back and quickly gave the man with the glasses a hug, turning back to Marco.

"Marco," James said happily, pulling the man closer, "I'd like you to meet your guide, my own flesh and blood, Connor Martin!"

"Dad..." Connor tried to get out of his father's grasp. "Not in front of the new guy..."

"Sorry, son." James replied, still with his goofy grin. "I get a bit carried away with the name-calling, I mean, you being my son and all! Well, I got a meeting with the shareholders. Connor, make sure you show our new employee why he'll love working with Explorer so much!"

James waved to the two of them as he entered the elevator going up. As soon as the elevator doors shut, Connor groaned loudly.

"Sorry 'bout that." Connor said, looking at Marco a bit of embarrassment in his tone. "It's just my dad... he can be..."

"No, man." Marco said, smiling a bit, thinking about his own parents. "I can relate."

Immediately, Connor grinned at Marco's comment. He began to light up like a light-bulb. "How about we start the tour with the laboratory?"

"Sounds great." Marco said as they quickly entered the next elevator.

* * *

The metal elevator doors parted as Marco and Connor strode into the lobby. Marco noticed the lobby had a strong pharmaceutical scent, and it felt like he walked right into a laboratory. The ceiling, floor tiles, and walls were coloured an institutional white, which reminded him somewhat of a hospital. Connor guided Marco's attention towards a door which opened to a laboratory. On the counter was several substances of different colours concealed by Erlenmeyer flasks, some as bright as red and others as deep as blue. Connor gave him a small hospital mask and rubber gloves to put onto himself.

"Wait here." Connor assured as Marco strapped his mask and gloves on. The CEO's son left Marco for a minute and came back carrying a small cage and a flask with a red liquid to the lab counter. He set it down as he kept speaking to Marco.

"This is the Biomedics Laboratory. The company has been partnering with the US Government and other charity organizations to find a vaccination for some of the most incurable diseases and infections, like Ebola." explained Connor.

Connor began to take the rubber stopper off of the flask and absorbed a bit of the red liquid into the needle. Marco stepped back a bit quicker than he thought he did, as Connor noticed.

"No worries, Marco." Connor grinned. "It's a special new type of antibiotic we're gonna make public in a week. It doesn't explode or do any harm. It only heals."

He opened the small cage to expose a small white rat. The rat looked rather sickly and motionless as Connor picked it up with one glove hand and laid it on the table.

"What's wrong with that rat?" Marco asked, piqued with curiosity.

"We had it infected with malaria." Connor explained, holding up the syringe. "This red potion will do wonders..."

He prodded the needle into the rat's behind, as the rat wheezed at the pain and tried to struggle away while Connor injected the liquid. "Hold him steady for me, please."

Marco held the rat down as Connor kept injecting, the rat being depleted of all energy. Connor pulled out the needle quickly once the process was done while Marco removed his hand.

After a few seconds of observing the rat, it managed the strength to stand on its hind legs yet again and was frolicking happily around the table. Marco gasped.

"But... shouldn't the healing process have taken longer?"

"Marco," Connor spoke, putting the energetic rat back into its cage. "You're one of a select few privileged people who is able to see what I've shown you here. We only show this to trusted employees... whoops!"

Connor had then clumsily knocked the empty flask off of the table with his arm. As it was falling in midair, Marco caught the flask in midair and placed it on the table.

"Nice catch..." Connor complimented in awe, noticing that the Hispanic had caught it.

"No problem, man." Marco replied.

Adjusting his glasses, Connor lectured onward. "Anyways, let me show you to your work station."

* * *

Stepping out of the laboratory, Marco asked Connor, "So what's in that antibiotic to make the healing process speed up?"

"Uh-uh-uh, Marco." Connor taunted. "I can't disclose that information to you unless you're of a higher position in the company. It's a company secret."

Marco was a bit bummed out at the rejection, but opted not to pressure for any more answers.

 _It's your first day on the job, Marco. Don't annoy anyone with your curiosity._ He scolded himself.

Connor and Marco stepped into a huge room. The first thing Marco saw was several grease-covered men working on different pieces of a bigger machine, which somehow resembled a dishwasher. Many of them were tinkering with a seperate piece of scrap metal of some sort. Blueprints were scattered all over the wooden desk in the center of the room.

"Welcome to my favourite place in the whole company," Connor grinned, "The MechLab, also known as the Mechanical Laboratory."

To gather the attention of the other workers, Connor took out a little bell from his pouch pocket and rung it. It was loud enough for the other employees in the Lab to turn towards him.

"Men and women," Connor spoke loudly, "I'd like you to meet Marco Diaz. He's our new employee here."

The rest of the employees waved happily towards the red-hoodied man. "Hello, Marco!"

Connor turned around to face the new employee. "How about I show you some of our previous inventions?"

"Sure, I guess."

Connor took an item from the wooden shelf behind him. "Surely you remember this from several years ago, right?"

It was a yellow banana-shaped case with a bubble-like casing attached to the end of it.

"The Banagic Wand?" Marco noticed.

"Yup. Fun Fact about this;" Connor explained, "My dad told me some employee who used to work here at _Explorer_ came up with the idea for the Wand and the company accepted it. They apparently thought the guy who pitched the idea was drunk at the time, I mean, squashing bananas into a delicacy? Really? However, since we were running short on ideas, we decided to manufacture the idea anyways into the Appliance Market. It was a huge hit and was one of the few inventions that got _Explorer_ on the map."

"Interesting." Marco said, quickly changing the topic, " Y'know, I still don't understand what you do at this company."

"Oh," Connor chuckled, "I didn't really clarify that before, did I? I work as my Dad's assistant. He's not an internet guy so I help him with web services and stuff like that. I've been tinkering with machinery like this for as long as I can remember!"

Connor was putting the Banagic Wand away when he almost slipped and knocked off the wooden shelf again. Marco quickly jumped up and held the shelf steady so it wouldn't fall. Miraculously, nothing from the shelf fell to the ground.

"Man, I blabber on for too long, eh?" Connor laughed even harder than before. "I guess you bailed me out yet again, Marco."

"No problem." Marco grinned, continuing the long tour Connor was bringing him on.

* * *

_**Explorer's CEO Office** _

Mr. Martin was secretly intimidated, sitting at his main desk with the taller shadowy figure sitting in the red chair right in front of him.

"It's amazing, isn't it?" The suave CEO said cheerily. "We're building this entire company and this product based on a singular magical element that hasn't even been discovered on the human periodic table. I owe you a lot, Mr..."

"And it's my pleasure working with you, James," the figure interrupted. "I'm happy to keep providing you this magic, provided that the expectations on the other end of the deal is met."

"Fair enough." James replied, sweating a bit internally. "You've gotten my company pretty far by providing us with that pink dust, Megant... um, whatever you call it. I mean, y'know how revolutionary it is to finally be placing the definition of magic in the hands of the common consumer on Earth?! Products like ovens, washing machines, and vacuum cleaners will run 100% more efficiently and faster than ever before! We're even using this element to come up with antibiotics to beat Ebola and Cancer, of all things! We're solving problems that have taken years in mere minutes, and breaking so many laws of physics with the shit we've produced!"

"Mageantium." the shadowy figure corrected. "The rarest substance from my home dimension. It's used to power magic of the Royal Family bloodline. It's the exact same magic Mewman royalty uses."

"Wait," James asked rather questioningly. "If you say that this substance is rare, used to only power magic of a royal bloodline, then how do you get such an abundant supply of it?"

"I have connections." scoffed the shadowy figure. "I can assure you that I have a legitimate source for getting Mageantium. I would by _no stretch of the imagination,_ obtain this substance illegally."

"As long as it's rising the company profits, I'm fine with it." shrugged James, as he laughed even more manically slumping back even further into his chair. "We probably need a higher supply of Mageantium in the next week though. The products are being manufactured faster and faster. We need to keep up with the demand of the market."

"Sure can do, Mr. Martin." assured the figure, turning his attention to the book in his hand. "Under one condition..."

"And that is?"

"Get me the employee known as Wilson Martinez."

"Alright, alright man, I'll write you his address right away." James spoke. Turning his back on his mysterious accomplice to look through employee files, the CEO thought, _Why would he want a dirtbag janitor, of all people?_

* * *

**Marco's Apartment  
Echo Creek, CA**

Marco opened the brown door of his apartment, tired from the tour of the workplace. Connor had shown him a lot of inventions which preformed suspiciously quicker than they were supposed to. Marco questioned several things during the day's events. Why wouldn't Connor tell him what was in the antibiotic that sped up healing? What was making the technology and medicine more effective and more efficient? The man's fatigue clouded his thoughts, blocking him from thinking about the answers to these questions. Immediately he went to the fridge to grab yet another light beer.

Slumping over to the couch, he opened the light beer with a hitch. Slurping on the can, Marco felt guilty that he had drunk two light beers in a row, especially when he was supporting an active job now.

Seeing as though he was extremely tired with nothing to do for the rest of the night, Marco decided to flip through his smartphone and look through some of the pictures, just because. He giggled at several of the pictures with the college parties that he had gone to over the years with Alfonso and Ferguson. He reminisced at many of the old photos when Star was still around. It was not until a certain photo where Marco suddenly froze.

There was a picture, labeled _4 years ago_ , with him and Star posing for a selfie. Except this time, something was off. Star was _kissing_ him on the cheek as Marco stared into the camera with a grin. He never had been in a romantic relationship with Star before, nor did he remember when and where he took the photo. Examining the photo closer, Star's eyes were also closed, indicating her emotions were _genuine_.

Insomnia kicked in as Marco blacked out on the couch, his phone dropping onto the carpet below.


	6. Dream Within a Dream

Star awoke.

The queen looked around her. Complete blackness. The sky was pitch black. The ground she was standing on was pitch black. Feeling around her, she felt a stony-like surface beneath her.

Looking around, with no discernible way to tell which way was which, she began to call out, hopeful for an answer.

"Hello?"

Right after, a light emerged from the total darkness. Looking up, she could see the gloomy sky above her. It was several feet above her, somewhere where she wouldn't be able to climb out. Looking up from her position in the pit, she also saw the nurse on that day, Ingrid, eyes unmoving, not blinking once.

_"May the space god be with you, Queen Butterfly."_

Right after, Star heard a male's voice right above her. _"...the entire state of the kingdom has been in shambles since you left for Earth."_

Looking at the opening above her, Star could see her own adviser staring at her with unblinking eyes. It also didn't help that when she looked to her right, she saw her deceased mother, staring at her with the same unblinking eyes.

 _"Young madam,"_ her mother spoke shrilly, _"This is no time for lollygagging. You have a kingdom to run!"_

Trying to find a way out of escape from the deep pit, she looked up to find all three people above her grabbing a medium sized boulder, ready to throw.

"NO, NO, NO!" Star screamed in a panic. The frenzy wore off as the boulders were chucked down the pit. Star shielded herself with her exposed arm as the boulder smashed down onto it. Her arm had turned a ghastly purple. Ingrid, Queen Moon, and the adviser seemed to have an endless supply of boulders from above and chucked every single one down the pit she was in. The three of them spoke in unison as well, each having something different to say.

_"May the space god be with you, Queen Butterfly."_

_"You are the last hope for the future of Mewni."_

_"When will you start acting your age, rather than that of a immature child?"_

As the stones rained down on her, Star tried to struggle around the limited space as she held her arm up even further. After contact from yet another boulder, Star had heard an ear-piercing crack coming from her arm. She kept the arm up as she found her feet covered with an abundance of grey stones that crippled her. When she finally lost the strength to keep her broken arm up, she took a flying stone right to the forehead as she fell backwards, hitting the back of her head on a rough stone.

Almost depleted of all energy to keep living, Star kept hearing the barking voices of the three stone-throwers.

_"May the space god be with you, Queen Butterfly."_

_"Lead Mewni to victory!"_

_"GROW UP!"_

Star blacked out.

* * *

Star awoke.

The setting quickly changed. Rubbing her eyes and looking around, she found herself lying on a moss-covered rock. Around her were nothing but huge woodland trees. A small dove was cooing from afar. Star was rather undressed, wearing only a white, dirt-stained midriff with an equally stained short-skirt.

As she stood up, she took the time to look around. Second-guessing as to where to go, she wandered through the lush forests, taking in the forest's natural beauty. As she took small steps through the forest, smiling at the deer that dashed past and greeting the doves with a smile, she smelt something off.

Smoke had replaced the once-pleasant aroma of the forest. Looking behind her, she saw a speck of orange in the forest, about a mile away from her current position, barely visible by the disordered position of the trees. Star gasped as a tree came down with a thud.

An explosion crashed on her own ears as a rather short soldier ran from the explosion. He tripped over a log and fell flat on his face. The man was wearing a knight's helmet with light battle-armour, which was now stained red. Star rushed over and knelt down from the soldier behind the log. Removing his helmet to look at his face, she was shocked when the young boy had ginger-coloured hair with troll green eyes. The boy resembled her friend from Earth, Ferguson. The boy looked like he was much younger than Star, maybe fourteen years old? He looked petrified, and was now coughing up blood. Star removed the plated chest-armour as she tended to the boy's wounds, cutting a piece of her skirt off with the boy's small knife to use as a towel.

The boy panicked.

"Hey, hey." Star assured him, patching him up. "I won't hurt you. I won't hurt you."

"T-t-t-they're coming..." the boy cried weakly. "Save y-y-yourself..."

"Not without patching you up." the Queen spoke sympathetically, before hearing another explosion from behind the log the two of them took refuge behind.

"Who did this to you?" Star asked.

"M-m-m-monsters..." the boy spoke, before his eyes rolled back into his head. Star stared at him, looking at the boy, hoping that his eyes would open back up again, but the moment never came back. She had just known this boy for the past three minutes, yet Star hugged him like a mother would to a son.

Just then, shouting was heard from afar. Other lightly armoured Mewman soldiers rushed through the forest, screaming and petrified, past the fallen log that Star was behind. Quickly grabbing the small knife belonging to the boy, she bolted towards the opposite direction of all the soldiers running.

Another soldier noticed her and spoke, "You don't know what you're doing, lady."

"I can get through on my own." Star said through gritted teeth. Out of the forest into a grassy clearing, she looked up, staring right at the eyes of the attacker. She couldn't believe who she witnessed on top of the tall, grey Warnicorn. It was the small-grey kappa creature, Ludo. To her shock, the monster was also waving the Royal magic wand in his hands.

"Haha, Princes- Oh, I'm sorry, Queen Butterfly," the monster laughed mockingly. "Funny isn't it? Now the tables have _finally_ turned."

Four other monsters wielding heavy swords and maces also approached Star. The princess began to look analyze the attackers. Five different monsters with heavy armour and wielding heavy weapons. Ludo was the weakest link, but he was on a giant warnicorn. Star was heavily under-dressed for the occasion and only wielded a small knife. There was really only one option in this scenario.

Star dashed in the opposite direction heading back into the woods.

"GET THE WA-," Ludo screamed, before realizing the wand was already in his possession. "... I mean... MAKE HER PAY!"

As Star dashed past, the tree in front of her burst into flames. Looking back, Ludo had the wand up in attacking position from on top of the warnicorn.

"FLAMING FIRE BLAST!" Ludo shouted as the wand blasted fireball after fireball. The fire blasted several trees right in front of her as Star made her way through the forest barefooted.

Maneuvering her way through the trees, Star didn't dare look back as the forest was engulfed in flames right behind her. Ludo and the armored monsters gave chase, hot on her heels.

As she jumped through the forest, in a zigzag motion so the enemy wouldn't be able to hit her, a fiery explosion went off right behind her. The blast sent Star spiralling down the hill ahead of her. As she landed, she put a hand in front of her face. Her body began jerk in all directions as she rolled down the hill monsters skidded down the steep cliff in hot pursuit.

The blonde queen kept rolling, despite the eventual slowing due to her body being slammed into the slanted ground several times. Her rapid descent failed to halt until she slammed her face headfirst into a wide tree trunk.

Star blacked out.

* * *

Star awoke.

This time, she found herself in a room. No object in particular was in this room. The room was freshly painted in a blank white colour, with no doors nor windows caved into the walls. In fact, Star had walked right into the wall, thinking it was an endless white abyss.

As she tried to recover from slamming her head pretty heavily into the wall, she looked back. Where she was originally standing, a grey table was placed. Behind the table stood Prince Dragonfly holding a medieval sword. His icy cold eyes centered on a boy, no, a human boy, sitting in the chair in front of the boy. Petrified, the boy's mouth was locked shut with a piece of duct tape, a brown rope tied around him. Star gasped, immediately recognizing the boy.

It was Marco.

Prince Dragonfly was very bold in his speaking. He turned to Star, flashing a devilish grin at her. "Miss Butterfly! Pleasure to see you here, m'lady. Tell me something: If you could choose one of us to live, would you spare me..."

The Prince then adjusted his sword in Marco's direction so that the tip of his sword was placed under his back.

"...or him?"

Star immediately found a bow and an arrow had magically warped into her hands through the source of an unknown white aura. She quickly slung the arrow into position of the bow, locked the arrow in position with daring accuracy, and let go.

The arrow flung until it met its target, head on into the skull of the blonde-haired prince. He fell to the ground with a thump.

Star was excited by the sight of her old friend, finally being reunited after four grueling long years. "MARCO!"

She hugged him, to which the boy smiled. The Queen untied the tan-skinned boy as she finally felt happy to be reunited with him at last. She felt like someone who won the lottery. She felt as light as a literal butterfly. She felt a sharp pain searing through her chest.

A sharp pain.

Looking down, she saw a sword pierced through her chest, protruding through her back end. Marco had reached for the dead Prince's sword and stabbed Star during her aura of joy. He dislodged the sword from her chest as the queen fell backwards, lying down in a pool of blood.

"I'm sorry Star. I hope you understand." Marco said as she weakened in strength.

Star blacked out.

* * *

Star awoke yet again, this time screaming in her bed.

When Star finally calmed down, she looked around. She was in her bedroom, safe and sound. She checked under her bed, as though a monster was lurking underneath it. Star exhaled, letting out a breath of relief.

King River Butterfly suddenly barged through the bedroom door, spear in his hand. He quickly looked around the room in suspicion.

"What is it, daughter?" River yelped feisty, slashing the air with his spear. "Who's attacking you? Monsters? Goblins? Clowns?"

"Dad." Star said calmly, "Go back to bed. It was nothing but a nightmare."

"Oh." the King said, disappointed at the absence of a monster for him to fight. He sat down on his daughter's bedside. As he sat down, Star thought she saw a tear roll down her father's bearded cheek. She stood up and looked her father right into his deep blue eyes.

"Dad?" Star said, looking at her father. "What's wrong?"

"No, no..." the bearded king asked. "This isn't about me. It's about you, my queen. Tell me something... was your dream unexpected in your definitions?"

"You could say that."

Star was surprised that her father would have guessed such a thing. Instead, he kept asking her more about her dream.

"Was your dream like a combination of multiple different dreams?" River asked.

 _He's reading my mind,_ Star thought. She then looked her father in the eyes and said, "I definitely saw more than one dream."

"I see." the King muttered. "One more thing. Did a dream end with you dying or fainting, only for you to awake in yet another dream?"

Star was immediately taken aback. Her father had read her mind just like a textbook. "How did you know..."

The king, tears still flowing down onto his hairy beard, began to speak. "Your mother _*sniff*_ had a similar dream the day she was to ascend to the throne."

Amazed, Star began to question what her mother could've possibly dreamed about that was so similar. "But what do you think this has to do with my dream?"

"I _know_ how this relates to your dream, Star." The king said, his attention now focused to the starry sky as viewed outside of his daughter's bedroom. "Star. It's rumoured that something out there in the stars, far away from our own dimension, was trying to send you a message in the form of a dream. For some reason, all Mewman queens receive an unexplained and odd nightmare nights before they are to ascend to the throne. Nobody knows why it happens, but according to legend, many people say, either one, that these dreams show the biggest worries of someone being a queen, or two, it's a sign of future things to come during your reign."

With this new information, Star was suddenly flustered. Why had Marco stabbed her in the final dream she had? Did that mean that her best friend, the boy she had trusted for all those years, was suddenly going to betray her? She began to finally make the connection to the Blood Moon Prophecy and gasped.

The two nobles, father and daughter sat side by side on the bed in silence. The tears that were trickling down her father's face began to began to become apparent.

"Star," the bearded blonde blubbered up in tears, "I loved your mother. I know you couldn't see much behind her nagging and persistence for you to follow the rules, but you've never seen why I married her in the first place."

"I thought it was an arranged marriage."

"My dear daughter," the king said sadly, "Of course it was arranged. But obviously I would have a partial say on who I'd want to marry. I wouldn't want to be stuck with someone who I didn't want to be with for the rest of my life now, would I? I don't think you'd want to be stuck with that demon kid for the rest of your life, right?"

Star was flustered by the small comment from her father. She shook out of it and asked for more of the story, "Then why did you marry my mother?"

The king chuckled a bit. "When you grow up and mature as a Queen, you will realize something very important. Lustful desires, falling in love because of attraction ultimately defeats the purpose of true love. True love appears when there's someone in your life that you care for so much that you'll be willing to risk your life and spend an eternity with that person. The main secret of romance is that it's simply a deeper version of friendship that goes way beyond the realms of loyalty."

Star thought back to some of her previous exes, like Tom. Tom was just a small fling, someone she admired because of his looks and suave attitude. When she spent more time with Tom, she realized who he really was. His good looks didn't make up for his often fiery attitude. Her relationship with Tom never escalated because she only saw him as an object, not as who he was as a person.

"I know I dropped Prince Dragonfly on you rather quickly," the King said, "but I'd suggest you try to get to know him. Even if you don't like him after all the times you tried to spend with him, there's always another suitor who will come at some time. I care more about your future interests rather than marrying you off as quickly as possible, my dear."

Star gazed out into the night sky. She then turned back to her father and muttered, "I'll try."

Her father quickly hugged her. "Thank you for understanding. I love you, my dear."

"Dad?"

"Yes, Star?"

"The adviser was telling me," Star asked while fearing the inevitable, "That the Mewmans have been demanding democracy within the kingdom, and that people are becoming more impoverished each and every day... Is this true?"

King River turned away from her for a second, sighing. "Yes, the kingdom has its problems which had gone on for years now, but it's harder to fix than you think. We need to keep up the financial support of the kingdom, as well as try to increase wealth throughout the kingdom. There's not really a middle road in this matter."

He looked back at her and continued. "Also Star, I cannot hide information this crucial to your role as the Queen... but the democratic reforms are already beginning to come together. A council of the highest elders of Mewni have been assembled and wish to meet you in the Castle after your mother's funeral. I was going to tell you tomorrow, but I guess now's a better time for it, anyways."

The king began to tuck her in and gave her a kiss on her heartcheek. "Sleep tight. You've got a big day tomorrow."

As her father left the constraints of his daughter's bedroom, Star slumped back into bed. She dreaded yet anticipated this day for such a long time. Sometimes she felt like she just wanted to be fighting monsters like she always did all those years ago.

Moreover, she faced further questions about the dreams she had. If they were a sign of things to come in the future, how would each dream fit into the picture? She understood how some of her fears were displayed, but what would happen to her future?

 _I was in a genuine relationship though, and it ended horribly. Maybe I'll never love again_ , the princess thought to herself before spending the next few hours trying to recover hours of sleep.


	7. Wilson

At night, the Explorer building was rather dead quiet, compared to the usual bustling ambiance the scientists provided during day. The only audible voice was the sound of whistling coming from the men's bathroom.

The nightly janitor, Wilson Martinez, whistled as he wiped the tiled floor clean of any mess, doing this while listened to some rap music through the earphones attached to his phone. Once he was done, he dumped the mop back into the cart and pulled open the door of the men's room.

The lobby was pitch dark, minus a few lights hanging from the ceiling. The Explorer building at night gave Wilson the creeps. He sometimes wondered if he wasn't the only one in the building as he usually thought. He began to pull the sanitary trolley over to the supply closet cautiously. Grabbing his phone, he activated a small light from the phone as he moved through the long corridor. After a few seconds, the janitor heard what sounded like a dull reptilian slither. Immediately, the man froze in his tracks. Looking back, he aimed the flashlight right behind where he had been walking. Everything seemed in order, and no doors were in and out of place.

 _Snap out of it, Wilson,_ the man scolded himself, shaking his head. _You got stuck working the midnight shift for the entire month. Tough it out!_

Despite the darkness and limited brightness, Wilson had no problem finding his way to the supply closet to return his work tools. Turning on the lights of the closet, he quickly made sure that his mop and trolley were all gone. Wilson followed his basic routine. Dump the water out of the trolley, put the mop back where the other mops go, no questions asked. Wilson's midnight routine was suddenly caught off-guard by a small creak from the door.

Turning back, the bulky Mexican man put up his fists in fighting position, aiming his flashlight right at the door. He was bulky and muscular, but he wasn't willing to be gunned down or stabbed, especially in a supply closet. He waited for a few seconds to see if that door would open, where it did not.

Wilson was sweating like mad, as he crept to the door to swing it open. He had his fists up, ready to defend himself against the possible attacker. He swung open the door, ready to punch and...

The man's fist met nothing but air.

Shocked, Wilson looked to both the corridor left and right of the door, but no figure was seen. He let out a sigh of relief, and absentmindedly closed the door, heading to his right, toward the exits to clock in.

What he didn't notice, however, was a tall lanky figure that was lurking behind the door. Wilson walked away, with a bit of security and confidence shown through the way he took his strides. The figure kept staring at him.

The figure grinned rather devilishly as the janitor walked down the aisle.

* * *

Wilson pulled into his driveway. As he turned the ignition of the car off, the glowing headlights faded to black.

Getting out of his car, Wilson felt it was best to have a smoke before he went back into the house. He got out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter, and lit the cigarette. Leaning on his car, he exhaled as smoke billowed from out of his mouth. A tear slid down his face as he reminisced through his dark past, remembering his wife and two children inside the house.

Just as Wilson was about to step inside, he saw a lurking figure standing in the roadway. The figure began to walk towards him, and it was getting closer and closer. The buff janitor took a few steps back and drew his fist back. In his other hand, he turned on the flashlight of his phone, as the figure was in talking distance of him. The man backed off, not believing who the person standing in front of him was.

It wasn't even a person. It was a _lizard_. He was standing much taller than the man himself, with glaring gold eyes and possessed a rather long tail. His green scaly skin reflected in the glow of the moonlight. He was dressed in a formal tuxedo, red tie and everything. Wilson dropped his phone upon the sight of the walking lizard.

"Hello." the tall lizard introduced, approaching him until they were standing nearly feet to feet.

Wilson's first instinct was to shudder in terror as he flatly dropped his cigarette onto the pavement, backing up onto the car chassis.

"P-p-please, don't hurt me..."

All the lizard did was sigh, putting a hand to his face in embarrassment. "Oh yeah, I forgot... darn naive muggles."

The scaly lizard approached the scared muscular man, and grabbed his white shirt. The man gulped, fearing for the loss of his own life. Instead, the lizard proceeded to use his dense hand to whack his cheeks until the man snapped out of his trance.

"I. Am. Not. Going. To. Hurt. You." the lizard said a word with each little slap on the man's cheeks. "Wake up."

The man felt his numb red cheeks as the fell back onto the car, gasping with fear. "What do you want from me?"

"No." The stern lizard replied, looking toward the man as the lizard stroke his chin. "It's not about ' _me wanting something from you_ ', no. This is about you."

Wilson stood up a bit taller, realizing that the giant lizard in front of him could possibly help him. "Wh-wh-what did you say?"

"I said that I can help you." the lizard silently spoke. "I've seen the pain and agony from behind the closed doors of the house right behind you. Low income. Barely keeping afloat and only surviving on government welfare. You need the hospital to cure your daughter's disease, but you can barely pay for her treatment."

The lizard quickly pulled something out of his pocket. It was a small piece of folded up piece of paper. The lizard took his time to unfold the piece of paper. Wilson noticed part of the lizard's right middle finger had been chopped cleanly off. It was so cleanly cut that even a piece of bone was visible. The sight of this almost made Wilson barf, if the sight of a 150 pound lizard wasn't enough for him to comprehend already.

As soon as he unraveled the paper, the lizard unveiled a rectangular piece of paper. It was a white check. Wilson's eyes glowed at the sight of the amount of the check. It was payable to him, and it was payable for one hundred thousand dollars.

"You see, Mr. Martinez," the lizard explained, looking dead into the eyes of the man, "I am an executive for that very company you work for. Explorer Corporation. I'd like to help you and your family get by, provided that you meet the correct terms."

"Well... what kind of terms do you expect from me in return?"

The lizard quietly whispered something into the muscular man's ear. When the lizard was finished, Wilson gulped. "You want me to do _what_?"

"I know that's a tall order, Martinez." the lizard said. "Even I have trouble letting go of things. But I'm telling you. You and your family get the check, _and_ a free antibiotic to cure your daughter's disease, provided that certain criteria is met. I'm sorry I can't change it. It's confidential orders from Explorer. We don't cash in the check or give you the antibiotic unless the expectations are met from your end of the deal."

Wilson was stuttering now. As he was left in an inconsolable silence, the lizard stashed the check back into his pocket. "I'll let you think about it. But remember, your family's current situation can be erased entirely with this little slip of paper."

The lizard approached him and held out a small business card. "Here. Ask for my name once you get into the building. If you do change your mind, I will be waiting for you at the Explorer Building at 1 PM this afternoon."

The lizard then crept back onto the street, walking farther away from the man. Under the spotlights on the street, the lizard kept walking along the suburban street.

"That's it for now, Mr. Martinez." the lizard's voice called out from the street. "I'll see you around."

Wilson looked back at the business card he was given. There wasn't even any home or email address on it. The only thing written on the small card was a hastily scribbled name.

 _ **Toffee.**_ read the business card.

Looking back up, Wilson could no longer see the figure that was once walking on the street in plain view.

The sound of crickets chirping was the only audible sound that filled the night as Wilson Martinez stood still in shock.

* * *

As he headed up his bedroom, Wilson stopped by his daughter's bedroom to see his four year old daughter asleep. The bed was more of a flat mattress in the center of the room, mostly because the Martinezs needed to cut costs on the bed. Her breathing was supported by small breathing tubes tubes stuck into her nostrils.

Wilson knew her daughter was a deep sleeper, so he wasn't as quiet as a parent usually should when he sat comfortably near his daughter's bedside. The father looked right at her daughter. He had tried to stay strong for his family, but all those moments where tried to do this wore on him within every passing day of survival.

Wilson looked up to the ceiling for a second. Tears began streaming down his eyes as Wilson Martinez broke down in front of his sleeping daughter. Letting out all of his tears, he began to clasp his palms together, close his eyes, and say his prayer.

"Dear L-lord." he stuttered, looking up to the ceiling. "Thank you for blessing me with this wonderful opportunity. Please let my family f-finally be h-happy. I've sinned against you, oh Lord, I lost count of all the _*gasp*_ mistakes I made in my l-l-life. But Lord, even if I have to do what that lizard told me to do to save my family, please protect my daughter when I arrive. I know I have sinned against you yet again for what I'm about to do, but I promise that it will be the last time."

Wilson paused for a second to remember his family. His impoverished parents who didn't have the money to support him. The parents who had to work night shifts at the factory to give him the opportunity to survive. He remembered his wife, the one who he argued with daily over money but loved dearly. His daughter.

Wilson continued praying through the muffled sobbing. "...and Lord, please keep my daughter and wife safe. Help them understand why I did what I did. I don't understand why it's come down to this, but if this is how I must gain my family happiness, then I will comply."

"Daddy? Why are you crying?"

Wilson looked over to his side to find that his daughter was now awake. He looked into her brown eyes. He had never noticed it before, but his daughter's eyes were glimmering. A glint of curiosity and innocence shadowed the eyes.

Wilson looked right at her daughter, but his vision was blurred as his tears kept falling. He quickly raised his arms, allowing the smaller child to hug him. They stayed like that for a while, unmoving, while his daughter's focus began to blur.

"Lily?"

"Yeah?"

"Tell your mother tomorrow that I'm getting a promotion at work tomorrow. I'm going back to work this noon."

 _A promotion to heaven_ , Wilson thought sarcastically, trying to ignore the fact in his head.

Lily's mood suddenly began to sadden. She looked right at her father. "Daddy, why do you have to work so much?"

Wilson began to look right at his daughter sternly. "Lily dear, I want to tell you something. It's important for when you grow older. I believe you'll grow older. You are strong, Lily. You can beat this sickness."

"Yes daddy?" Lily's eyes glimmered, again with the same curiosity as before.

"Never make the same mistake I did." Wilson said. "Do well at school, go to college, get a good job, that's all."

"Wha?"

Wilson sighed of embarrassment in his own head. Of course his daughter was far too young to understand what he was talking about. She had several years before high school. However, Wilson still prayed that his message would register, something his daughter would remember in the future.

"Never mind." he spoke with a serious tone, "Now go to sleep. You've got a long day tomorrow."

"Good night, Daddy." Lily said as Wilson kissed her on the cheek as he slowly exited Lily's bedroom, closing the door behind him.

As soon as Wilson closed the door, he slouched down in front of the wooden door to the point he was sitting.

Without the factor of embarrassment to get in his way, Wilson sat down and cried some more, face buried in his own hands.


	8. The Lost Fable

**Earth Dimension**

Marco woke up with a jolt to the sound of _Space Unicorn_ by Parry Gripp blaring from his smartphone. Yawning, he turned on his smartphone with semi-closed eyes. He looked at the clock on the phone. It was two o'clock in the morning. The caller identification was anonymous.

 _Great._ Marco grumbled, sighing. _I totally need whatever they're selling at this hour._

The man quickly clicked on the call button while putting the phone's speaker to his ear. "Hello?"

"Good morning, Marco Diaz." said a stern voice on the other end of the line. The voice was muffled to a point where one couldn't identify its source, but clear enough to Marco to hear what the voice was saying.

Marco was flustered upon hearing his own name said by the mysterious voice. "Who are you? How... how did you know my name?"

"Marco, Marco, Marco." the voice chuckled. "I am the sky from above that towers over you when you are walking in any dimension you go! I am the ground, the solid earth, that supports you. I'm the animals that call this place called Earth home. I know and see what you're doing at all times, Marco."

Marco immediately groaned, and looked for a way to waddle his way out of the call. "Look, I think you got the wrong number, I'm not a dealer..."

"How is it that I know so much about you, but you know nothing about me?" the voice interrupted shrilly. "If I'm not mistaken, we have encountered each other many times in the past. You never had a liking for me, I do recall. Understandable for a huge disappointment as yourself."

Upon hearing the last sentence, Marco suddenly woke up and put two and two together.

"Toffee." Marco grumbled. "How did you get my number, and what do you want from me?"

"Nice guess." Toffee said, somewhat amused. "You always ask so many specific questions, boy. Have you ever thought about what these questions mean before asking them?"

Marco began to fume. "Wherever you are on Earth, why don't you just go back to the Mewni dimension? Why are you even bugging me at 2 AM?"

"Did you ever hear about that old dimensional fable on Mewni, that one about the monster king?" the lizard spoke at the other end, completely disregarding Marco's questions.

"I have no time for your stupid fairy tales." Marco spoke, rolling his eyes.

"I believe this is one you'd want to hear." Toffee's voice spoke on the other end.

"Look is this really the time?" Marco asked, rather impatiently. "I have work tomorrow, and this really isn't gonna help me get much sle..."

"Long ago," Toffee interrupted, beginning to tell his story. "There was a young Mewman boy who lived in the village just outside the parameters of the Kingdom of the Butterfly. He was strong, bold, and very outgoing. Many of the village people gave the boy up as a candidate to be the new king, a strong fighter. They treated him like his flesh and blood."

Marco stood listening as Toffee paused. For some reason, Marco suddenly found himself wanting to hear more about the fable. "Go on..."

"Glad to have gotten your attention." Toffee smirked. "Anyways... while the people lobbied for this boy to be a king, no one realized that he had been gathering... let's say... negative interests behind the backs of his own people..."

* * *

**Outskirts of Mewni  
Long ago...**

A small boy with fine black hair, who was no more than eight years old, trampled his way through the dark woods.

Naturally, the boy wasn't scared of the woods at this hour. It had become routine for him to go on midnight treks, when he was free from the restraints of combat training during the day. Simply thinking about these trainings tired him out on the inside.

But now he was free. He gleefully bounded above each rock and ran out of the wooded area, right into a sandy beach with the sight of the open ocean playing as the backdrop. Kneeling near the shore, he splashed his face with the clear, sparkling water while laughing with pleasure. The boy removed his sandals to dip his feet into the chilly seawater and began to make bigger and bigger splashes the farther he ran away from shore.

However, as the boy took a pause from his own enjoyment, he saw a green glowing light in the woods from a distance. The boy quickly walked away from the bay and stepped into the woods. The boy leapt up, grabbed his sandals and put on his cloth tunic. He began to investigate the source of the mysterious light in the distance. He stopped when he saw the entrance of the main source of the light, which turned out to be from a dark cave.

Taking careful steps into the cave, the boy thanked the green light for being as bright as it was. The boy easily found his way around and was able to remember his path in case he got lost. Finally the boy was astounded when he got to a large stalemate at the very end of the cave. There he had found the source: A large green marble orb, lying delicately on a sharp rock.

Approaching the orb, the boy looked right at the green orb and inspected it with only his golden irises. The glowing green orb seemed to have some kind of mystical-like, moving swirl that entranced him more than anything he had ever seen before. He finally had the courage to place one hand over it.

The marble found glassy and wholly smooth. The liquid swirl inside the orb began to find an instant attraction to his hand. Soon the magical swirl inside the orb changed into the shape of the boy's palm-print pressed against the shell orb.

After finding no more amusement in the green orb, the boy slowly decided it was wise to turn back and go home. At the exact moment when the boy did turn to go home, the swirl expanded from inside the orb. When the boy took his first few steps home, a cracking sound was heard from the orb behind him.

The swirl from inside the orb began to expand outwards and, with an explosion, burst out of the shell with definite magnitude. What was once a smooth, spherical marble shell was now made of pieces of cracked marble.

As the boy turned back to see what the noise was, he saw a hazy spirit rise above him. The spirit looked like that of a dragon, possessing a pointy top forehead with bat-like wings. Upon its release from the orb, the spirit let out a bellowing roar.

"WHO DARE DISTURBS THE GREAT DRAGON SPIRIT?"

The boy trembled in fear as he found himself crouched on the floor, trying to back away from the intimidating spirit hovering from above.

"Who... who... are you?"

The dragon spirit began to look at the small boy below him and bellowed out in laughter.

"No, seriously," the spirit chuckled to no one in particular. "This is the boy who disturbed my slumber? This kid? I was expecting a wandering Mewman knight of all people, but **_this_**? _This_ is too delicate."

The boy's fear subsided as confusion consumed him. He began to question the nature of the dragon. In fact, the dragon wasn't the only one who was surprised by the person in front of him. In old Mewman legends, the townspeople were always frightened by a dragon spirit living in the woods, threatening to use its fiery breath to destroy the entire village. This dragon spirit was not the one the boy had pictured in his mind.

The dragon sized up the boy in front of him, and reached out for the boy with a scaly red hand.

"I don't fight anyone but fearsome knights, and occasionally, monsters that annoy me." the dragon explained, chuckling. The boy hesitated, then slowly reached out his hand and touched the giant hand in front of him. Their palms stayed touching like that for the while, until the boy backed up. Seeing that the small boy was scared, the dragon tried to start a small conversation.

"What brings you to my humble abode at this hour?" the dragon asked, looking at the pitch-black darkness outside.

"...dunno." the boy murmured back.

The dragon picked him up with one of his hands, as the boy looked up at the dragon's eyes. Both of them possessed the same golden colour eyes.

"You might want to go home." the dragon said. "I mean, the folks at home are probably worried about you. I know for a fact that your home is that direction. If you keep walking you will probably find it."

"No, I can get home." the boy explained. "I'm just out here because my parents will never let me have free time to just trek the woods like this."

"Man, that seems worse than being locked in an orb for ten years. Tell me more." the dragon beamed.

"I mean," the boy explained, "Everyone expects me to grow up to be married to Mewman royalty and to lead the army to drive monsters out. All I do each day is train, train, and train."

He than began to mimic the auditors in deep voices. "Use a bow, shoot perfectly on the bullseye, slash, slash, AND SLASH, with a sword! I never get times to just relax like this. I honestly hope nobody catches me out here."

"Hard life, kid." the dragon shrugged. "I barely have much company out here. Everybody is scared of this dragon in the woods myth so much that no one will even come out and see me. Last few visitors to this lair were some unlucky knights who ended up becoming my midnight snack."

"Really?" the kid laughed, "That sounds awesome!"

The boy and the dragon laughed at each others' stories throughout the dawn. When the talking had finished, the boy returned home to the village, promising to visit to the dragon again the next night.

* * *

**Present Day**

Marco paused for a second. Then deciding that he was going to hang up, the Hispanic began to talk mockingly enthusiastically to the lizard at the other end of the phone. "That's it? Well, I'd better be trying to get some more sleep! Bye-"

"Story's not quite finished yet." Toffee spoke rather grimly. "However, I understand that you have other plans, and it's way past your bedtime anyways..."

"HEY!"

Toffee let out a small snort from his nostrils. "...so I'll leave the story for another time. Buh-bye, Mr. Diaz."

The buzzer at the other line confirmed Marco's hopes for the call to be over. He turned over his smartphone onto the coffee table in front of his couch.

"Good riddance."

* * *

**Explorer Corporation Headquarters  
Few hours later...**

Marco burst through the revolving doors and began to quickly run into the building. He was at least ten minutes late by now.

Marco thought he could just slip by without anybody seeing that he was late for work, but as he was running into a corner, he almost ran right into his boss, James Martin. Marco just managed to skid to a stop just in time.

James noticed him and looked up for him. "Oh hey there, Marco. Late for work, eh?"

James and Marco stared right at each other with stern looks on their faces. Marco didn't know what to say as he began to tense up and felt sweat stream down his forehead. Just then, James let out a small laugh.

"Why so serious, man? Just relax." James said enthusiastically, patting his worker on the shoulder. "Don't worry. It's your first time late on the job. Happens to even the best of us here at Explorer. I remember I arrived at work one whole hour late! Man, traffic was so bad that day..."

James then remembered the important task he was to be doing and straightened himself out. He began to walk in the opposite direction, but not before bidding Marco farewell. "Anyways, have a great day at work, Marco."

As Marco was about to head to the Mech-Lab, James turned back to him, remembering something. "Oh yeah Marco, the MechLab team is supposed to be working on the final testing of a new armour we're developing. Could you tell my son and the others that the whole first round of the concept project is due at closing time tonight?"

Marco replied "Okay,", and then proceeded to keep going to the MechLab.

Marco then thought, _Man, what a talkative guy he is!_

* * *

"So you're saying that the armour can withstand excessive heat and is also shockproof?" asked Marco.

"Precisely, Marco." his colleague replied. Marco inspected the plate of metal armour he was tasked to work with. It was full body armour covering the chest and heavily protecting the arms. Marco quickly lifted the piece of armour. Although it was made of metal, it felt surprisingly lightweight. The appearance of the armour reminded him of something that a knight from the medieval times would wear.

"What are you doing?" the colleague tried to stop him, but Marco had already lifted the light armour into the AEB (Automated Electrical Burner), which looked uncannily similar to a small glass cabinet. Closing the transparent glass door of the cabinet, Marco remembered very well from Connor how to work this particular machine, and quickly pressed a few buttons on the side of the cabinet, each labelled "FIRE TEST" and "ELECTRIC TEST".

A small protruding tube from inside the AEB sprayed fire right onto the metal armour, while several static-y sounding noises were heard. Once the testing was done, the AEB made a sharp _'ping'_ noise.

"Tests completed." the robotic male voice of the AEB spoke. "You may now remove the test object."

Marco slowly opened the door. Grey smoke billowed out from the armour. He was gagging the smoke out of his lungs as he waved it out of his peripheral view. Once the smoke had cleared, he saw the armour was in top condition, not mutilated into another shape nor dented whatsoever. The only drastic difference was the grey layer of soot on it.

As Marco hesitantly reached out to try to scrape the soot off the armour, he heard a familiar voice behind him.

"Careful, Marco." Connor chuckled as he entered the room from behind Marco. "Last person who tried to remove a tested item from the AEB with his bare hands got third-degree burns. Might not want to do that on the first day of the job."

Marco turned around to face Connor, as the colleague grumbled under his breath, grabbing the armour from the AEB with hot gloves. The colleague put it back on top of the main work table and left the lab for a coffee break. Marco and Connor were left alone in the near-silent, white-walled laboratory.

"Why does this company even need to manufacture armour like this anyways?" Marco asked with a hint of suspicion in his eyes. Connor adjusted his glasses and spoke passively.

"Marco, you probably know about all the backing we get from the American government, correct?"

"Yeah..." replied Marco.

"It just so happens we also support the American military. We're working on prototype armour for the troops to use over in the East."

Marco looked at Connor as though he was crazy. He looked back and inspected the metal armour. He lightly tapped his fist against it and pointed. "This thing? Has the military really started getting inspiration from the Middle Ages? I mean, look at it! Last time I checked, medieval armour became obsolete because of something called a _loaded gun_!"

"Marco, Marco, Marco." Connor sighed and chuckled as he slowly grabbed a small pistol from his lab coat pocket. "Watch and learn."

Marco suddenly stepped back as Connor aimed the gun right at the metal armour on the lab table. Connor pulled the trigger, shooting three bullets, each one going out with a loud bang. The bullets made a small *clink* off the metallic armour as the bullets bounced off it seamlessly.

"Bulletproof." Connor said with a smile. He looked at the Hispanic, who was now shuddering. "What's wrong Marco? I know that demonstration was shocking, but it couldn't have been anything more."

"Why are you even carrying a gun... IN THE WORKPLACE?"

Connor looked down at the gun he was holding in his hand. Whistling, he slowly tucked it back into his coat pocket. Putting on a wide grin, the CEO's son said, "You often get special permissions as a high member of a company. Heh, heh."

Connor then directed Marco's attention to the armour. "My point being... take a look behind you."

Marco looked back. Although there were definitely new scratches on the armour, the bullets hadn't dented the material at all. Marco even found the bullets lying on the concrete floor, slightly crooked from the armour.

"You see Marco," Connor said, walking over to Marco to pick up the bullets, "Like you said, the main reason that medieval armour has become obsolete was because of advances of the modern mechanics around it. Armour is also not used often because it was heavy to carry around or to get anywhere, especially when you had to travel for long periods in time. Now have you noticed how light this armour is and how it now withstands common dangers? Just because something is obsolete doesn't mean it can't be fixed or improved for the modern age."

"Very true."

Connor strode towards to the corner and leaned on the side table. He then looked to his feet.

"You've had a long shift. Take a break, Marco." Connor said. "Don't be gone for too long though. We need to finish fine tuning the armour before we present the final project to my dad tonight."

Marco obliged as he left the premises of the MechLab. Once he was certain that Marco had gone, Connor sighed in distress as a tear slid down his eye.


	9. Retrieving the Toolbox

Through the Mewman woods heading out toward the lake, a horse galloped swiftly along the dirt-ridden path pulling a horse drawn carriage, carrying Queen Star and Prince Dragonfly. They were on their way to pay their respects to the deceased queen. Her father had decided to travel alone to take care of important matters of the funeral possession. Star _also_ had suspicions that her father was trying to set her up with her potential suitor. Anyone could smell the awkward cheesiness stemming from this particular setup.

The carriage traveled over a soft bump as it traveled over an outgrown root of a tree sitting on the path. Star reacted slightly to the bumpiness of the ride and looked over the prince, who was sitting to the left of her on the carriage. Prince Dragonfly was sitting cross-legged on the carriage with a bouquet of roses in hand, looking through the carriage window and into the woods. The blonde-haired queen sized up the muscular man in front of her, and blushed profusely when he turned around to look at her.

"Well," Dragonfly spoke, giving faint courage to spark up a conversation. "It's been two days of me being in Mewni, and I know very little about you. I mean, I know this is a bad time and all, but we should probably take this moment to talk, maybe get to know each other."

"About what in particular?" Star asked with a hint of flirtatiousness in her voice.

"Anything is good for me, really," spoke the Prince. He looked over to her, becoming eerily close to touching her white-gloved hand. "I'll start. How are you?"

Star laughed politely at the prince's awkwardness and decided to play along with it. "I'm fine. How are you, m'lord?"

"Please," the prince said, giving a pushing-away signal with his hand. "No need to call me that. The formalities never work for me."

"Okay," the bright princess spoke, "How about Prince Dragonfly?"

The prince burst out into laughter. "Please. I'm the least-princeliest prince anyone could ever know."

"Sir Dragonfly? I did hear from my father you were a knight, after all." Star guessed, her eyes glimmering.

The prince let out an even louder chuckle. Eventually when he calmed down, he began to speak naturally to the woman right next to him. "Yeah, but it's not really anything, right? Your father told me that at least he allowed you to spend a couple of years in another dimension for training. I stayed in the Zoomi Dimension for all my life without dimension hopping."

"But isn't your dimension big?" asked Star, garnering interest in the conversation at hand, "Don't you like, y'know, do things in your own dimension?"

"A little. I don't get to travel that much. Mostly combat training, horseback training, etiquette training, heck, even a training for proper fashion trends. Like, when will I ever need that? You name it, Zoomi has it."

Star giggled, looking up at the blue-eyed prince. Their blue eyes connected as Star gave him an irresistible offer.

"Well, I officially welcome you to Mewni! How about I show you some real Mewman fun tomorrow? The woods are a great place to start."

"I'd love to!" the broad-shouldered prince shouted. The two monarchs laughed as the cart bumped and hopped along the dirt path.

* * *

As the horse pulling the chariot finally stopped along the side of a grassy clearing, Star peeked out through the small circular window and began to convey the surroundings. The Mewman King Butterfly quickly approached her and opened the door from the outside of the chariot. The new queen and the prince emerged from the chariot, unveiled as though they were presents being unwrapped during a birthday party.

Upon the arrival of the royal party, however, the cry of the hoard of people outside was quite opposite of a birthday party. Boos rung aloud from along the riverbank as Star, Prince Dragonfly, walked towards the river's edge. The crowd was held off by Mewman knights on both sides, standing guard and attempting to control the fracas from right behind them. King Butterfly held up his hands in front of the prince and the young queen.

"Jeez," Star muttered under her breath. "These people can't even show respect for a funeral."

"Not like they had any respect for their own Queen to begin with," shrugged the Prince. "I mean, on Zoomi it was tons worse. Our people over here are close to overthrowing the Dragonfly lineage from power. My parents are literally worried mobs will break in and try to murder them in their sleeps. I'm just here because my parents on Zoomi hope my future will at least be alright."

"That must suck," said the blonde princess, looking up to the handsome blue-eyed prince. "I mean, why should these people even get to judge us as villains? Sometimes that makes me want to rainbow blast these guys back to St. Olgas!"

"Be my guest." the prince smirked devilishly.

"Hm?"

"Go ahead and blast them. Well, don't aim right at them. Just give 'em a little scare to shut them up, right?"

From somewhere under her collar, Star pulled out her purple wand and quickly aimed slightly above the heads of the rioting villagers. Both hands were right in front of her, hands grasping the wand.

"I like how you think, my fair prince."

"Please stop with the formalit-"

"RAINBOW BLAST!" the princess screamed eagerly as a huge rainbow beam shot slightly above the heads of the angry mob. King Butterfly ducked as screams erupted from the crowd. The prince didn't even react to the princess's action and just kept walking forward.

When the blast subsided, the mob suddenly fell into a eerie silence. In front of them was the toothy grin of the blue-gowned princess.

"Thank you very much." Star spoke happily as she kept walking through the meadow. The crowd quieted drastically.

As she kept walking, she saw her father do something that he rarely did to her. He was scowling right at her. Star had only seen her father do this a handful of times throughout the years he had raised her. She interpreted the glare as, _'YOU ALMOST TOOK MY HEAD OFF! ARE YOU CRAZY?'_

Star sulked upon seeing how her father reacted.

As they finally got to the river's edge, setting foot on the sandy beach for the first time, Star and the Prince looked down at the wooden boat placed on the silky sand. Star could see her mother's body gently lying inside the boat, the first time she had seen her mother since she had died in the hospital. Her eyelids were now shut tight, her pink lips protruding somewhat outwards. Her body from the shoulder down was covered with a baby blue blanket. Roses placed on top of the blanket in blank white and bright red clashed with the baby blue from underneath it.

Prince Dragonfly made his way towards the boat first. He hopped down the ledge and stopped right in front of the boat. He closed his eyes for a few seconds and carefully placed the bouquet of roses he was holding right on top of the blue blanket. He quickly stepped back to let Star pay her own respects to her mother.

Star, despite the many different disagreements that she had had with her mother throughout the years, began to feel several tears stream from her eyes and melded onto her face. Star still deeply loved her mother. Love was one of many concoctions that drove Star's relationship with her mother despite many hindrances. No matter how many disagreements and rules she wanted to break, she knew it was because her mother wanted her own daughter to be safe from harm. Star chuckled a bit at her own naivety then, and how she constantly put herself in danger rather recklessly.

The princess stayed in front of the wooden boat for a while, her own eyes closed, ignoring any and all noises playing in the background. Her mind hummed a soft lullaby that her mother had hummed to her when she was just an infant. After what seemed like an eternity, Star finally opened her eyes.

She observed her mother's lifeless body yet again. Star hadn't brought a bouquet of flowers or any other gift, but she quickly repeated the lullaby her mother in her head as her fingertips touched her mother's pale forehead.

She quietly whispered, _"Thank you."_ before turning towards her father and Prince Dragonfly and nodding.

Star and the two men began to push the wooden boat into the river in silence. The river's shore was rather shallow, but Star's feet began to moisten as her high-heels stuck in till she was waist-deep into the river. The boat pushed farther than Star did, as the boat began to drift slightly to the right, swayed by the waves of the large river. Though the blonde-haired prince and her father had already began to climb the small ledge, Star kept looking as the boat floated farther and farther away from her. The last view of her mother that she managed to get was when the boat streamlined under a dark tunnel and was never seen again. A few seconds kicked in before Star crouched down, legs soaked in the river, and began to cry.

It hadn't dawned on her before, but Star Butterfly was finally accepted reality: Her mother was gone.

* * *

When Star climbed the ledge and made it back to the grassy meadow, she saw that her father and her suitor already at the carriage, several meters on the other end of the flat clearing. On one end of the meadow, the crowd's jeering got louder and louder. Star had had enough of these shenanigans and decided to take this matter right into her own hands.

The Mewman guards kept pushing the people back as Star approached. As Star began her first strides toward the huge crowd, the crowd was still overtaken with rough jeers, but the jeers began to show less confidence in front of the Queen. She stood firmly, wand in her hand, and finally spoke.

"Um, hello," Star's voice boomed, loud enough so the audience could hear her. "Can I please have the attention from the crowd for just a second?"

The audience began to stay in silence, awed at the presence of royalty finally speaking to them. Star was finally aware of what these people wanted.

"I know many of you are angry about the attacks the guards placed on your people two days ago. I am aware of the twenty-two lives that perished during the blast. I am sorry for the heartbreak that our royals have placed upon you."

Many of the members in the crowd were stunned.

"Yeah? Well, that doesn't really help bring them back!" a man screamed from the front of the crowd. "You killed my wife! She wasn't even rioting on that day!"

"I know you're not going to forgive the Butterfly lineage for what has happened, not for a long time, at least." Star said, replying to the man's outcry. "I understand, especially from today, what it means to lose someone. Many of you have lost loved ones prematurely. You feel they were taken away from you unfairly by royalty. You don't have to change your opinion about me as the new Queen, but you should at least understand that I will try to offer as much support to those who lost a family member on that day. My first order as Queen of Mewni will hopefully benefit the ones who have lost loved ones in the riot. I will be on your side during my reign. Your cries for justice will no longer be in vain."

Rather than the negative jeers from before, the crowd erupted in loud excited cheers as Star raised her arm up, giving a two-fingered peace sign to her people as she walked back to the carriage. The poor guards had to hold up the crowd with gleaming eyes.

Star's bearded father, who was watching Star communicate with her own people, gave her a proud grin. He rewarded her with a kiss on the cheek when she got back to the carriage.

"I'll admit today, daughter," the king said, "Before today, I had a lot of worries that you may not have been mature enough to take over the throne. After what you did back there, being able to gain the approval back from your people after one day as Queen, I have to admit that I may have misjudged you."

"Thanks dad," Star said, gleaming with pride as she got back into the chariot with Prince Dragonfly.

* * *

The carriage bumped out of the woods and back into the Mewman village. The horse took several sharp turns through the streets as it bobbed and weaved through pedestrians making their way through the streets. Many had to scatter out of the way to avoid the horse from trampling all over them. Finally, the carriage came to a stop in front of an old worn down building. This building was made with stones and stood rather tall. Star was immersed in the building's solidity as she looked up to find an eerie light from a window on top.

"Ugh," King Butterfly said, rolling his eyes as he held the door open for her, "The residence of the leaders of a New Mewni. They wish for you to discuss your plans for ruling Mewni."

Star recalled the talk she had about the new democratic reforms with her adviser and her father that night. These new leaders wanted an answer from her immediately. They would try to find any rigorous excuse to try to get her abdicated. She gulped and asked, "Why would some political hacks want to know about my plans?"

"They want to know if you're a good choice for the throne." The Butterfly king explained as he escorted his daughter through the halls, with the prince in tow. The three of them stopped at a wooden door, as the new queen looked deeply into her father's eyes.

"Just relax," soothed the long bearded king. "You know exactly what you're going to say. As long as you stick to that and make sound interested in what you're talking about, everything will go according to plan."

The King opened the door while Star looked inside. The room concealed by the door was plastered with hardwood flooring, and felt very Victorian, with an accurately painted picture of her mother hanging on the wall, nicely tucked between the gold framing. At the center sat a young woman with fair black hair. Her skin was slightly wrinkly, her lips plastered with lipstick. Surely someone this young certainly could not be in such a hierarchical position. The woman looked up.

"Ah, Queen Butterfly," the woman spoke enthusiastically, holding up a small cup of tea by the handle. "Glad to see you here! Want some tea?"

Star persisted as she heard the king close the door behind her. "No thanks, um..."

"I haven't introduced myself yet," the woman said, shaking the princess's hand gently. "Lisa Mantis. I'm a spokeswoman sent by the Interdimensional Change Act for Democracy. I have some questions to ask you. Let's get started, shall we?"

Star sat down at the chair right across from the woman. "Okay..."

"First off... What is your current position on the riots occurring in the village of Mewni?"

Star took a deep breath. She honestly thanked her adviser for telling her about such events outside of the kingdom that she gracefully accepted the question. "I think that mistakes have been made in the past, mistakes that we definitely cannot redo. They are engraved black marks engraved in Mewman history."

"So you don't think that something needs to change?"

"I think that, through certain events, Mewman royalty has gained a bad reputation. We've made mistakes, and we have been unable to fix in the past. I assure you things will be better from this point onward."

"How do you plan to do that," pressured Lisa. "You are aware of the many different problems plaguing the kingdom at this particular moment, am I correct?"

"Yes, I am fully aware," Star lied, looking at Lisa directly in her cold brown eyes. "I have gained much knowledge from my time on Earth. The kingdom has an abundant supply of Mageantium gained from the shard mines annually. Perhaps we could offer to use this magic for the good of the people rather than for the kingdom's own needs. We could easily create Earthly education for the younglings, while also giving clean sources of food and water. With the magic that we currently have, we could fix the current problems Mewni is facing by building institutions for such. We will make our Mewmans educated, and within a couple of years, the number of homeless and poor peasants will diminish."

"Interesting, taking an idea used by the people of the Earth dimension. And what happens if the rich supply of Mageantium from the shard mines runs dry?"

Star hesitated. She hadn't gotten to that point yet. The Queen recalled that the reason why a rare amount of Mageantium had been used to solve the kingdom's problems was because of the chance that the shard mines may run dry.

 _Stop running your mouth, Star!_ the Queen scolded herself, turning away from Lisa for a second. She quickly turned back to the noblewoman.

"There's barely a chance that the shard mines would run dry. Only reason the mines would go empty is due to robbers. They're heavily protected by the best guards in the dimension. No one from other dimensions knows the location of Mewni's central Mageantium supplier. We will make sure that our spending of the Mageantium is kept regulated."

"Interesting. I'd like you to tell me more."

From that point on, Star had a calm discussion with Lisa about the many Earth mechanics and laws set by authorities there. The Queen bragged about how Earth was a more ordered civilization and that Mewni would take steps to work towards creating a system just like Earth's. Secretly, at this moment, Star thanked Marco for helping her get through high school. Without his help tutoring in subjects like History, she would never have come up with ideas to reinvent the kingdom. Lisa's eyes glimmered the more Star talked on.

Finally, when the time was up, Lisa gave Star a small shake of the hand and said, "Impressive. You're quite the smart girl. I can't wait to see what you have in store for Mewni. I'll see you around."

As Star opened the wooden door to find King Butterfly and Prince Dragonfly, she didn't look back into that room. A huge weight had now been lifted off the Queen's shoulders.


	10. Deal with the Devil

Wilson Martinez felt anxious heading into the Explorer building. This certainly wasn't the same anxiousness that he had faced before, those desperate drives to the bank to pay his family's growing debt, biting his nails, on the way to . This was different. Unlike the times where Wilson had expected the worst, this time Wilson didn't even know what to expect.

Wilson slyly slid towards the clerk's desk in the main lobby. The clerk sitting there was a woman who looked to be in her late 30s. She had a wrinkly face, her blue eyes expanded by the wide-framed glasses on her face. She looked up at him, smiling.

"How may I help you?" the clerk asked, giving a standard complimentary question. Wilson stood trembling in fear of the future predicament he was to encounter, but found enough courage to speak to the lady upfront.

"I'm looking for a guy named... Toffee?"

The clerk looked at him with a slight bit of confusion but then looked right back at him with a devilish grin. With the same grin, she quickly shot up to Wilson's height and moved close enough to him so she could whisper into his ear.

"He's been expecting you," the clerk whispered in a rather creepy voice. "Just take the elevator to CEO Martin's office. He will meet you there."

Wilson gulped. He managed to brush past the clerk with a polite 'thank you', before nervously sliding away towards the elevator. The lady's tone certainly didn't help matters.

Once the elevator had leveled Wilson to the top floor, the man slouched his way in front of a wooden, windowless door that was facing adjacent to the elevator. He waited for a few seconds before slowly giving three consecutive knocks on the door. At first, he had heard nothing from the other end of the door. Breaking the silence was a creaky voice on the other end saying, _"Come in."_

Wilson shoved the door open to find the lizard from the night before, Toffee, sitting grimly in the office chair, hands placed firmly on the desk, while Explorer's CEO, Mr. James Martin, was sitting in a chair slightly behind Toffee. Wilson hadn't been in Mr. Martin's office before, nor ever talked to the rich CEO, but he knew from the times he glared at him as they both walked past each other in the corridor that he certainly looked down at him. For some reason, this was the first time that Mr. Martin had been smiling at him. Both the CEO and Toffee had smirks on their faces. Wilson got the creeps the more he stared into those faces.

As Wilson got closer to the desk, Toffee shoved a large blue backpack onto the wooden desk. When Wilson grabbed the bag and rummaged through its contents, he was shocked that tons of gear scrambled within the pouch were steel weapons.

"Man, what's with all of this?" Wilson asked, jumbling around loosely with the items in the backpack. "This is pretty hardcore for something that I'm doing to save my family."

"Just pay attention carefully to my instructions." the lizard explained, before turning and nodding to the shorter CEO. "James."

James quickly reached into a small compartment in his desk and grabbed a small portable earpiece. The black earpiece was Bluetooth, it had no port and when Toffee snatched it away from Mr. Martin, he immediately gave it to the bulky Mexican man.

"No matter the circumstances," Toffee spoke, speaking in a rather lecturing tone, "Keep that piece in your ear at all times. It has a built in earpiece so you can speak to us and we can speak to you. There's also a hidden camera on this so we can watch you at all times. It will be the only way we can communicate with you or see you, especially to where you're headed. I will give you directions as to how to use each item in the backpack when the time comes."

Wilson looked at the blue backpack as he firmly grasped the strips. He looked back at Toffee unamused. "What about my end of the deal?"

"Your end of the deal?"

"Yes." Wilson asked. "I want to make sure that my wife gets the cure as promised. I don't want you double-crossing me, man."

Toffee sighed, then gestured to Mr. Martin to make a move. "I think you can handle this, James."

"Oh, um... very well then!" James laughed awkwardly, looking at Wilson and leaving the room. "Wait here, I'll be right back."

After a minute or two, James came back with a blue-eyed, blonde mail-woman wearing blue attire followed behind the CEO and stood patiently behind him with crossed arms. James was holding a small cardboard package and gave it right to Wilson Martinez. Wilson noticed what the package was right away, as it was addressed right to his home address.

Mr. Martin spoke. "Okay, here you go. This is the cure to your daughter's disease. You can take all the time you need, make sure the serum is in there, check the package to see if that's the right mailing address, or whatever you want to feel comfortable. I won't BS anybody here."

Wilson opened the package to find a small flask with an orange liquid swirling inside.

"How do I know you haven't poisoned it?" Wilson asked accusingly. "Is the serum safe for consumption?"

Mr. Martin shrugged. "Try it."

Wilson unscrewed the cork on the flask and dipped his finger into the vial. He sucked on his fingers and took in the weird taste of the serum. It was almost like honey, but tasted like normal medicine. He waited a few seconds to finally come to the conclusion that the serum was indeed harmless. He screwed the cork back onto the flask and quietly placed the flask back inside the small package, sealing the flaps of the box shut.

"Are you now thoroughly convinced?" the Explorer CEO asked with a tinge of impatience on his voice. Wilson nodded. James came up to snatch the package from the Mexican's hands and gave it to the blonde mail-woman in the room.

"Deliver the package straight to the Martinez household. They're on the address as printed on there." James ordered the blonde woman.

"Right away, sir." the mail-woman said, giving James a quick salute before marching off. Once she had exited the room, Toffee and Mr. Martin's attention turned back to Wilson. Toffee was now carrying what seemed like a small pair of safety scissors with horns.

"What are those?" Wilson questioned, a shocked look on his face.

"That's my next point." Toffee said, "These are Dimensional Scissors. They are used to travel between dimensions, such as the Earth dimension as seen here. Allow me to demonstrate."

Toffee took the scissors by one end and sliced a portal out in thin air. The first sight of this portal shocked Wilson as he stepped back, his mouth wide open.

"Don't be scared of a simple portal. No one has ever been harmed by dimension-hopping with the scissors before. _Well, not yet anyways..._ " Toffee said, muttering the last sentence under his breath so Wilson couldn't hear.

"I thought when you first talked about dimension hopping, it was all _wack_ yesterday." Wilson inquired. "But man, you have caught me by surprise."

"Yes, and I feel the things you will see from this point on will just become more unbelievable. Main advice: Expect the unexpected." Toffee spoke, pacing back and opening a portal again. "Anyways, I left a pair of dimensional scissors in the bag. You've seen how I used them. As long as your mind thinks about heading home to the Earth dimension, the scissors will create a portal to just that. Now, are you prepared?"

Wilson slung the backpack onto his shoulders and looked determined. "Ready."

"Head into the portal, and wait for my first command." Toffee commanded as Wilson headed into the black portal. When Wilson could no longer be seen, the grey lizard closed the portal behind him. Toffee looked back at the curious long-haired CEO.

"Alas, a new era for the Explorer Corporation and the monsters begins." Toffee announced triumphantly.

"Indeed."

* * *

Wilson exited the black portal and began scanning the area around him. The sky above was a glazed purple with several clouds glooming over the horizon. Around him was an old dirty village, with houses made of stone, with angular wooden roofs looming over each house. Wilson heard the earpiece make an activated 'ping', before Toffee's voice spoke on the microphone.

"Alright now, you see that castle up there?" Toffee's voice boomed. Wilson looked up to find a small castle perched on a low-mounted hill slightly above the meadow overlooking the village.

"Mhm."

"Great, that's your next stop." Toffee said, "Oh wait, but before you do, there's a small vial in the backpack. I want you to drink all of it."

"All... of it?" Wilson gulped.

"All of it." Toffee said rather sternly. "Naturally I feel bad for making you taste two questionable liquids within the hour, but this liquid is a must. It won't hurt, I assure you."

Wilson quickly rummaged through the back until he picked up a vial that had a clear liquid inside of it. He quickly screwed off the cork and cupped the circular vial in both hands, quickly gulping down the liquid right until there were only droplets left.

 _Man, you must be crazy,_ Wilson thought to himself, _First you go and accept a deal with the devil, you're willing to go on a mission that could cost you your life, and now you're willing to drink strange liquid a crazy talking grey lizard is telling you to. I've never heard **that one** before._

As Wilson pondered this, he realized the rapid growth of brown hair all over his body, including his chest. His entire body began expanding outwards, to the point that the red t-shirt he was wearing ripped along with his blue jeans. Looking down, Wilson screamed when he saw brown hair all over his arms and body, his feet replaced by hooves, and he also saw several horns sticking from his head.

"Wh-wh-what have you done to me!?" Wilson hollered into the microphone, looking down at his now changed body, getting even more frightened by the minute.

"Relax, Mr. Martinez," Toffee soothed albeit rather unsympathetically. "It's a Minotaur Morphing potion. It's the only way you can get into the Unicorn Kingdom undetected, without any hint of suspicion. You will morph back to normal within minutes."

"Unicorn Kingdom?" Wilson asked, picking his belongings up, and now darting up the path to the castle. "You told me this was a bank with a vault in it! Gosh, I wish I were dreaming now!"

"Sometimes your own perceptions can often deceive you, Mr. Martinez," The cunning lizard explained through the microphone. "And I didn't lie either. This particular mission _does_ involve stealing from a vault."

Wilson got to a drawbridge with two rather buff unicorn guards with clad hooves, large bellies, and soft white fur, were standing guard outside the castle. He hesitated and continued on. However, just before Wilson could take another step, one of the guards positioned his arm to block him from passing. The guard looked at him intensely. Had Wilson been discovered? After all, they were walking unicorns while he was a walking minotaur. There was a difference for sure. After almost a minute of inspection, the unicorn guard lifted his hand out of Wilson's way.

"You're late." the unicorn guard growled. "Get to the shard mines. We've got reports of thefts occurring in the past month. Make sure nobody steals anything down there."

Wilson politely smiled at the unicorn and ran into the castle. "That was too damn close."

"I always plan ahead," Toffee said with a positive overtone. "Take the stairs down to the lowest level."

Wilson ran into the castle where he saw many different unicorn entities walking around the cathedral-like building. He even saw what seemed to be two talking... _unicorn heads?_

There was a bigger, masculine unicorn head who was speaking to a smaller, more feminine unicorn head with a pink mane. The bigger unicorn head looked to be scolding the smaller one.

"Now now, you are to be ruling Uni and the entire Unicorn Kingdom someday," the big unicorn head spoke to the smaller one, "Enough with this mischief!"

Wilson had already darted past the two unicorn heads as the smaller one drooped with sadness. He found the stairs and kept descending. As he kept going, Wilson thought, _Please tell me I'm dreaming! Please tell me I'm dreaming!_

After some sixteen flights of stairs downward (yes, Wilson had counted), Toffee exclaimed, "Good, you're there."

Wilson observed the basement level around him. It was actually a cave, no, like a mine, and he was completely alone in it. Wilson saw several glowing purple rocks protruding from a rock wall and the ceiling above, and, oddly enough, saw a galloping unicorn running on a treadmill attached to a small machine full of the purple rocks. The treadmill was grinding the purple rocks while purple dust spewed out of the treadmill and into a bucket. Still at this point, Wilson was convinced that he was dreaming.

"Now, listen to me very carefully," Toffee lectured onward. "Grab as many of those purple rocks as you can."

Wilson began rummaging through the bag and found a pickax. Wilson dumped the remaining two things from the backpack: a mace and a small mysterious box with an eye. He began to axe at the wall and grabbed any loose purple rocks that he could muster.

As he kept working, he began to see the brown fur begin to grow back inward, into his skin. He began to shrink until he was a naked young man yet again. He felt awkward and was lucky nobody was watching him. When he had grabbed enough of the purple rocks, so much so that it filled the entire backpack, Toffee gave further instructions.

"Now, press that button on the mace." When Wilson did, the head of the mace collapsed to unveil a rather small portal, enough for Wilson to stick the entire backpack into it so Toffee could receive the purple rock-filled backpack back at Explorer HQ.

"So is that it," Wilson asked, "Am I done?"

"Not quite yet," Toffee said. "Take the last item, that box, and hit the red button on the side."

Wilson did as he was told, but right as he did, the iris on the eye began to glow red and made a _'beep beep beep'_. The beeps were getting more and more rapid.

"That doesn't sound normal! What do I do!?"

"Calm down," Toffee said on the other line. "Obviously you can't fit through the mace portal, but I remember I placed a pair of dimensional scissors in the bag as well."

Wilson looked down towards the ground. No! There weren't any dimensional scissors, and the beeps were getting louder and more rapid. Wilson rummaged through the other compartments, seeing if there was anything, **anything** , that Wilson could have possibly missed. When he looked in every possible area, even his own pockets, he called back to Explorer HQ.

"There's absolutely no dimensional scissors."

"Oh." Toffee said, "My mistake. In that case, you'd better run."

"WHAT?" Wilson said, looking back at the box, as the beeps were as loud as ever before. He rushed towards the stairs but by then it was too late.

The eye from the box flew open as the rest of the box expanded. A carnage of flame erupted from the box as Wilson blacked out.

* * *

When he awoke, everything around him was black. He saw a figure in the distance. It was a woman, whose skin was wrinkling and hair graying, but Wilson still recognized who it was.

"Mother!" Wilson screamed, as he took in the embrace of his mother.

 _"Everything is okay now, Wilson. Everything is okay."_ his mother replied.

* * *

From James Martin's office, Mr. Martin and Toffee were watching the computer screen silently. The transmission from Wilson had cut off to static. James shut off the monitor and began to sit quietly in the side. Toffee was still carrying the blue backpack, counting how many purple rocks were in the backpack. The lizard handed the bag over to James Martin. James was still stuttering in shock.

"Did... you just blow up an entire castle?"

Toffee looked away and quietly said, "Yes. I had a score to settle. Those unicorn people were heavy allies with a barbaric, power-hungry race. I needed to slow that race down. They would've helped had the race caused war on Earth."

"W-what about Wilson? Why couldn't he find those dimensional scissors?"

Toffee grabbed something from an inner pocket in his tuxedo and out came a red pair of scissors.

"I lied."

James was utterly baffled. "You said you were getting Mageantium legally. I didn't agree that we could kill anybod..."

"But you _did_ promise to meet my conditions for getting this magical Mageantium you wanted so much." Toffee scoffed, throwing down the blue bag harshly on the desk. Some of the purple Mageantium rocks fell out of the opened pouch. "I got you your magic, You gave me my opportunity to do vengeance on those who wronged me and my people!"

"Fine. Fine. We'll start work right away." James spoke, raising his hands in a surrendering position.

"Also," Toffee stated, asking for another offer, "I want to clear the entire building. Send everyone home early. No one, except the two of us, should know the work we're doing here."


	11. Motherhood

If there's one thing that Marco Diaz was growing annoyed with on the job for Explorer, it would have certainly been wiring the stupid electronics of the robot in the first place. It forced him to crouch down and look closely at the intense procedure he was doing. It hurt his eyes, as well as risking the chance of burning himself with his blowtorch. He was focused on soldering together an electrical wire, part of the major project, which was to create highly generated suits based on the armour that Marco had tested earlier that week.

When Marco had finished a large portion of the soldering, he stood up tall and looked around. Everyone else was contributing to a part of the armour in some way, making the man envious of the jobs others were doing. Out of the corner in his eye however, he could see a man in a tuxedo whispering in Connor's ear, who was supervising and helping the project. The man ran off as Connor looked nervous. He waved his arms erratically.

"Hey! HEY!" Connor shouted, to which the rest of the workers stopped and paid attention to the CEO's son. "I just got word that my dad has some important guests and that we need to clear out early. All work is done for today. Have a great weekend."

Connor turned and started to walk away.

Several of Marco's co-workers sighed and cheered happily, relieved that they didn't have to work the extra hours. Marco quickly finished the last piece of soldering and put his soldering iron, solder, and other miscellaneous tools away. He grabbed his red hoodie that he hung away during work and went off.

Just as he turned the corner, Marco found Connor reminiscing on a red couch in the middle of the lobby. He decided against sitting next to him at first, but somehow his confidence countered the decision. He changed his turn for the main door to the couch where Connor was sitting. He plopped down in the seat right next to the glasses-wearing man.

"Marco," Connor said, looking pleased to see the him, "Congrats on your first work week, I suppose."

"Thanks," Marco said, brushing aside the compliment. "What are you doing here, exactly?"

"I dunno," Connor spoke glumly. He began to toy with the small smartphone in his hands while Marco kept him in peace for the little while. "I guess I've never been let out early for work before. I have nothing to do." The man with the glasses chuckle slightly as Marco looked on.

"Yeah, I get that feeling on weekends sometimes." Marco said, reminiscing on the college weekends he had, free from the realms of major essays or exam study, craving them by doing absolutely nothing. This time however, with the benefit of Marco's extra time, the man also found himself without anything to do. He did have an idea that would benefit him as well as the bored scientist.

"Hey," Marco prompted, grabbing Connor's shoulder, half-thinking his plans over. "I'm going over to Echo Creek Park. Wanna come with me?"

Connor's eyes lit up, surprised by Marco's offer. "Sounds great, Marco. I-it's not often I get invited out by someone. I mean, I appreciate it."

"No problem, buddy." Marco said, finding his more confident side piping up. His safe and quiet demeanor was now extinguished by a more extroverted, daring beast within his soul. "You've made my time at Explorer great in the first few days on the job. I felt as though I should return the favour."

Connor looked flattered. He then nodded his head, albeit rather quietly. "That sounds good. Thanks, Marco."

Both of them headed out of the door and walked towards Marco's Civic.

* * *

 

**Mewni Dimension**

Two unicorns trodded into the woods, clopping its hooves on the dirt path around sharp stones and fallen branches that stood in the pathway. On the saddles of the two unicorns was soon-to-be Queen Star along with a short-haired, stocky Prince Dragonfly in a stunning blue outfit, repsectively. The two nodded at each other with a smile as they ascended into the forest.

"I suppose this is the good ol' fashioned 'Mewman fun' you offered this morning, correct?" the Prince spoke, looking directly at the blonde-haired Star Butterfly.

"Brilliant, Holmes." Star giggled, quoting an Earthly character her earth friend Marco Diaz introduced her to on Earth. The Prince looked slightly puzzled.

"Who's Homes?"

"Never mind."

Star and the Prince went deeper and deeper into the forest, so much so that the pine trees began to cover the view of the Butterfly Kingdom that was right behind them. When they finally got to a part of the forest inhabited by a stream, they dismounted their unicorns and sat right on the grassy edge of the stream.

"Nature is great, isn't it," the Prince said, gawking at the sky. Star looked up as well, seeing a rather ugly vulture was swooping up and down with the backdrop of a blue cloudy sky. "Is this the fun on Mewni that you wanted me to see? It's nice, but I wouldn't call it 'fun' in particular."

"What would you consider fun, my fair prince?" Star smirked, leering up at him with a wide grin.

"You can stop calling me that, m'lady, the name's Quinn. Quinn Dragonfly!" the Prince said sarcastically. "Anywho, I always got a vibe from you as the 'daring' sorta type. Y'know, something that involves risks with a kind bit of 'danger'."

"You're sounding like my old friend from Earth," Star chuckled. "Well, if you really wanted some danger, then what about this?"

Just before Quinn knew it, Star had given him a playful shove. He quickly lost his balance as he plummeted face first into the shallow waters. Once his face ascended from the stream, he found that he was having trouble resurfacing from the waves. The waves were rather mellow for a river, certainly perfect swimming conditions. The prince, despite the lack of obstacles he was facing, felt himself bobbing up and down, exasperatedly trying to reach the shore.

Star's cheerful laughter sullenly turned to horrified shock as she began panicking at the realization that her suitor could not swim. In desperation, Star waved her wand in a frenzy and came up with the first spell on the top of her head.

"MAGICAL FISH TORNADO," she screamed as she aimed the wand at the stream below. A purple beam shined from her powerful purple wand with grey bass being fired out of the wand particular to that of a cannon. The fish began pouring into the sea and when they came out, a frenzy of fish spiralled around the unconscious body of Prince Dragonfly. The fish poured around the Prince as his body levitated out of the river, the fish forming a ring around him as they picked up the blonde-haired prince. The tornado came to a standstill on the shore of the river. As his body settled down onto the river, the school of fish subsided as they plopped onto the grassy meadow and each fish took leap into the river one by one. Looking at the body, Star could see his eyes rolled back.

"Oh my goodness!" Star panicked. She had never done CPR before in her life, but she knew she certainly had to try. With her hands, the exasperated queen pressed her hands hard on his chest. Just as she was about to put her mouth to his in a way to give him oxygen, she heard a slight gag from the prince. He began sputtering and coughing, finally coming to. The first sight upon waking up was the blonde queen staring from on top of him, her nose almost touching his. Star was blushing at the awkwardness of the situation while Quinn was processing the situation before him.

Finally Quinn said, smirking, "Nice attempt to sneak a kiss."

Star was between giggling, tears, and sighing in relief while Quinn straightened out his wet hair. "I honestly couldn't have done it better myself. Maybe next time you should tone down the 'accidental drowning' part. Certainly not healthy, I tell you."

"I-I-I, I didn't know you couldn't swim, you idiot!" Star sputtered, punching him in the arm, "You almost made me think I killed you!" She was almost in tears now.

"Not my fault there isn't any signs of water on Zoomi except for the wells and rain," Quinn chuckled. "It's just sand, sand, and more sand over there. You see why I was excited to come here in the first place?"

Star began to speak rather seductively, "Maybe now's the time to learn, if you know what I mean."

The prince began to look at her awkwardly. He shifted quickly out of his awkward face and met the queen's eyes with glimmering enthusiasm. "I'd love to, m'lady."

"Hypocritical, aren't you, seeing as though you're the one who doesn't like the formal names."

"Yes, only the prince gets to address his princess with such formalities," the prince said as he removed his uniform until his bare chest was showing. Star giggled just as the prince stepped cautiously into the river, clinging to the river's edge.

* * *

 

**Earth Dimension**

Connor had gotten out of Marco's car and looked around the park. It was just a normal park with forest greens everywhere. Connor was not particularly fond of going outside to a park, but since Marco had been such a friend to him, he always thought that he was doing things that were very good for him. In high school, Connor never cared for many relationships, both of the romantic or friendly level. In high school, his friends occasionally invited him out, but he would normally reject those offers in exchange for a night of working on one of his father's newest inventions in the garage. Yup, time was certainly much better spent on the means of science then toilet papering an elderly person's home.

But Marco, Connor felt, was rather different from the other 'friends' he had in high school, or in his life, for that matter. Observing him work for only a couple of days, Connor noticed over time, that Marco was responsible, with a charming personality on the side. Compared to the shenanigan-pulling friends he had in school, Marco seemed like a safe bet for someone to hang out with.

As soon as they got out of the car, Marco immediately tried to initiate a conversation. "So, whatcha wanna do?"

"Up to you," Connor said.

"Alright then I definitely know what to do-" Marco said while his phone's Space Unicorn ringtone rung out. He blushed slightly while Connor chuckled at the absurdity of the noise. "-Hold on, I gotta take this call."

He pressed a button and put the phone to his ear. "Hello? Yeah, Mom? What do you need? Alright, I'll come over tomorrow. You know that these are my work hours, right? Wait, you didn't know I had a job, I told Jackie and I thought she would've spread that news by now, no? Yes, thank you, mom. Yes, I'll make sure I'm there early tomorrow. Alright, say hi to dad for me. Okay. Love you. Bye."

Marco hung up. He turned to Connor rather awkwardly as they continued walking on the concrete path of the park, with trees, rivers, and natural scenery in the background, Marco continued, "Parents. Always wanting to see their kids after university. I can relate to you, I tell you, I can relate."

"Eh, at least you have two parents," Connor muttered. Marco looked back at him stunned. He didn't think that Connor might've only had a father.

"I'm so sorry," Marco replied sullenly. "I didn't mean to assume..."

"Nah, my mother's not dead," Connor said, trying to reassure the red hoodied boy. "She just left me when I was young. Other than that, my dad never told me about who she was or where she went."

"Darn," Marco said, with a shocked look on his face. "That's pretty tough, isn't it?"

"I got used to it," Connor said. "Never really knew her anyways. Far too young. My dad never told me because he was always keeping it hidden. Whenever I'd ask anything about my mother, he'd make up a new story every time. One day I hear that my mom left because of a very bad argument, another time I heard that my mother cheated on me with another man. I've stopped listening to those stories ever since."

"That," Marco pointed out, noticing the inaccuracy of the situation, "sounds very different compared to how your dad acts at the office."

"He's coping," Connor replied, sinking down in confidence. "I've heard from relatives that they never knew my mother. She never came to any family reunions or anything. They said my father was just like anyone's average, happy family-man. Then ever since my mother left, he changed."

"Changed?"

"Yes, changed," Connor rambled on, unaware that he was about to walk into a green park lamppost. Marco shoved him to the side.

"Careful..."

"Thanks Marco. Anyways, for a few years, it was great. I never noticed anything wrong. My dad taught me the wonders of the different subjects in school, and I was helping him occasionally with his company's inventions. We were just like a family, just me and my dad. As time went by, I felt some dark cloud was hovering over him. The energy during the time we spent together drained him immensely. We began spending less and less time together. He started drinking more and more. It was when I was fourteen, I believe, when something on the news changed him." ****

* * *

**Martin Household  
Several Years Ago**

Fourteen year old Connor Martin ran into his home after school waving a piece of paper in his hand. As he ran into the kitchen and finally into the living room, he couldn't wait to break the great news to his father lounging on the red one-seater couch.

"Dad! I got a perfect score! On my first high school math test, no less! I owe you a lot-" Connor hollered cheerfully, but he became shocked when he was met by his father's cold shoulder, his focus glued on the television set blaring in front of him. Connor looked over to the TV, which was playing a news broadcast. It was centered around a boy with short brown hair and dark tan skin, face blurred out for protection, along a girl with blonde hair, green dress, a headband, and with some hearts which seemed painted onto her cheeks. They were kicking and beating hideous looking monsters, some of them looking like animals walking on hind legs, as they approached. The broadcast also seemed to be filmed in an awkward vertical camera angle, like it was filmed by an amateur viewer recording from his phone. The news banner read, ARE THERE OTHER DIMENSIONS OUT THERE?

"Do other dimensions exist other than our own?" the broadcaster spoke, starting the story. "This is certainly something to be questioned after the appearance of a fourteen year old girl from a dimension known as Mewni, who recently came to our Earth to gain knowledge of Earth culture. According to several eyewitnesses, they say the girl, known by the full name Star Butterfly, carries a wand that can preform various magical spells. Scientists have yet to prove what is in the 'magical' wand to give this girl the ability to preform powerful magical spells, which some say, are powerful enough to disrupt the balance of the Earth as we know it."

A man in a white trench coat appeared on the screen. A news banner collapsed underneath the man reading, PROFESSOR ROBERT BROWN, ECHO CREEK COLLEGE.

"We'd certainly love to bring Miss Butterfly in for some testing," Professor Brown spoke passionately to the reporter, "I'm pretty sure that our world is interested in what this inter-dimensional magic can do, and what it's capable of doing. This power could shape the future of our culture, and we need to know what exactly drives such magic. Science has solved most of the world's greatest mysteries, and this mystery, we feel, is no exception to that theory."

"Researchers at Echo Creek College are still waiting for permission by the girl's legal guardians on Earth, Rafael and Angie Diaz, to allow them to run tests on this magical girl, but the researchers also say that comes with risks on its own-" concluded the newscaster.

James shut off the TV. He downed another sip of his beer bottle and looked at his son, with a crazy smirk smeared along his face. "Did you hear that son? Magic! HA, magic! You really think that it's magic? No, in a couple of days, those scientists will expose everything! Nothing has been explained without science, and that's how things are going to stay."

James brushed past his son as he took another sip from his beer bottle, and walked right out of the living room and up the stairs. "Now excuse me, I have a few phone calls to make."

Connor stood there, baffled and confused by his father's sudden outburst.

* * *

 

**Earth Dimension  
Present Day**

"For a couple of months," Connor continued, "My dad was determined to prove that this girl's magic was absolutely false. He tried every news article, he read every research paper about it, went through every law of physics he could muster. He was obsessed. Eventually the girl was brought in for testing, but the scientists found nothing. My father finally took the last straw and accepted the fact that magic existed. I thought that his obsession was done, and my regular, sane father would come back. Nope. His focus shifted on how he could change the world and capitalize on riches with such magic, and tried to find the recipe for the girl's magic."

Marco was utterly baffled. He remembered that his father allowed several businessmen to come in and meet them for dinner. His parents, Star, and him sat with the men as his parents talked something political while he and Star ignored them. But at night, when Star was asleep, Marco snuck downstairs and overheard his parents arguing about something. He now understood what they were talking about, and why Star missed school the next day.

"Oh," Marco said, the only true response he could give out at that particular time. He was unsure about revealing himself, the other boy from the family housed the girl all those years ago.

"But I've told you a bit too much anyways," Connor said. "I don't usually tell a lot of people this."

"I can see that," Marco said, a stunned demeanor over his face. "Tell me, has your dad had any luck with his research?"

Connor leaned in closer to his ear, clearly suspicious of saying something out loud to other people. "That's the scary part, he's acted more erratically then he ever has, and that says a lot. He's happier. He's changed into his third alter-ego and counting. He isn't telling me about it, but I think he's found something big."

* * *

 

**Mewni Dimension**

Star and Quinn galloped their way back to the Butterfly Castle, but as they got closer, they noticed several people flocked in front of the main entrance, but as they were got closer, Star saw her father King Butterfly, along with the spokeswoman from earlier, Lisa, her arm around the king in a comforting manner. The king looked like he had been sobbing. When the crowd moved away, they gasped at the arrival of the prince and the new Queen. When the king looked up and saw his daughter dismounting her own Warnicorn, his eyes glimmered and quickly rushed over to hug Mewni's new queen.

"Um," Star asked, unsure of the reason behind her father's sudden action. "What did I miss?"

"What," her father asked her rather accusingly, "We thought you went to Uni to visit King Pony Head's daughter. We thought you were dead!"

"What, what do you mean," Star asked, "I was just hanging out with Quinn Dragonfly by the river."

"Well, you'd better tell us where you're going next time," the King snapped.

Star had so many questions about the current scenario however, and felt the urge to blurt them out right away. "What happened to Uni? Why's there a crowd? What should I have been careful of?"

Still locked in the embrace, King Butterfly was still blubbering and unable to process anything right away. Lisa stepped up to explain.

"Miss Butterfly," she said, cautiously trying to land the upcoming news as softly as she could, "There was an attack on the Uni Dimension. Someone set up an exploding bomb in the Unicorn Kingdom. It blew up the entire dimension and killed several people, including, um- King Pony Head and his daughter."

Now Star realized she was the one crying. She broke away from her father's embrace and rushed up the kingdom steps crying. Dragonfly was about to put up a hand, attempting to stop her from getting away, but decided that it was the best to leave her alone.

When Star finally arrived at her bedroom, the first thing she did was jump into her bed and chuck one of her pillow off the balcony with a scream. She then sunk her face deep into the mattress and began bawling uncontrollably. Star didn't care about being a Queen and showing a good impression. Star didn't care about her actions, or anything around her. All that mattered to her were that the people she loved were taken away from her in a heartbeat.

"PONNNNYY HEADDDD!" she screamed on the top of her lungs, then resorting to calmer yet hysterical tears, babbling nonsense out loud, "I love you so much Mother, I love you so much, Pony Head, I will never forget you two."

She clapped her hands together in a praying like fashion, and said, "I swear that I will find whoever did this and I won't stop until justice reigns down on them!"

Star continued crying her eyes out, bawling into another pillow on her bed, not noticing that Quinn had arrived into her bedroom and was watching her with a deep level of concern showing on his face.


	12. Case Crackers

**Earth**   
**Explorer Corporation Headquarters**

Toffee was looking around the messy disorganized beakers and other scientific tools sitting on the lab desk. James was ready, he was wearing his white labcoat on with goggles. After moving a few of the tools from the drawers to his desk, James turned his attention to the lizard next to him.

"We get started, right," James said, looking nervous, "Did you get everything on my list from before?"

"Refresh my memory," Toffee said grimly.

James looked up at him and ratted off the first thing on his list. "The several pounds of Mageantium for testing."

Toffee shrugged, and pointed to James's workstation. "Check if you have enough in that bag."

James looked at the brown leather sack sagging on the lab table. He picked it up and looked inside. The glowing purple rocks were scattered throughout the contents of the sack. Picking up the sack, he moved one rock from the sack and placed it on the lab table. He looked back up at Toffee and listed the next item.

"The charger things that power the Mageantium wand's energy."

Toffee pointed to yet another sack. When James looked into it, he saw a ton of crystal heart-shaped chargers. He pinched the charger with his two fingers, observing it closely.

"Okay, that's it," James announced as he carefully set the charger down, grabbed a soldering iron from the edge of the lab table, and began to burn around the edges of it. The iron welding around the charger collapsed into a liquid upon the touch of the hot iron. He quickly removed the charger cover and began tinkering with the insides of the crystal.

After a few moments, James looked up from his project to ask a question, "Why did you want all my employees to leave early again? This work is certainly gonna take more than one person, y'know."

"Oh, I don't know," Toffee shrugged, "Maybe it's due to the fact that I'll be giving several of your workers aneurysms when they see there's a huge talking lizard. Am I right?"

"But I'm pretty sure I'd need workers," pointed out the CEO, "I mean, even my son isn't here, and he'd be more than willing to help me out here."

"Your son," Toffee asked, attention now piqued, "Where is he?"

"Doesn't seem right at all. When something like this happens here, Connor usually stays to see if I need help. I looked all over the building and couldn't find him. Probably started hanging with that Diaz kid again."

"Diaz kid, huh," Toffee's ears opened up even more, although he was brewing coffee near a machine in the office. "Who's this _Diaz_ kid?"

"Oh, it's this new guy who just joined the company a few days ago," James explained, " _Marco Diaz._ He's my son's age and they seem to be getting close. Whenever I see them they're always talking or working together."

Toffee took a sip of his coffee. He certainly observed Marco and knew he was now working at Explorer, but he opted to play the dumb card instead. "Marco Diaz? Hm, why do I have the feeling that I've heard that name somewhere?"

"You have?" James asked in a rather surprising tone, "Well, count me out of the popularity party, cause I'd have no clue. Some kinda celebrity or something?"

Toffee did not take James's joking tone well, but instead responded bluntly, "Funny for someone who has spent, _what_ , years, researching the Star Butterfly magic case, it's odd that he cannot get simple facts down. Always watching by the sidelines, and never the front man. That reminds me, why on Earth did you just take the research of others rather than asking the family themselves, what were their names again?"

"I knew enough to warrant my own reports, Mr. Toffee," James replied, chuckling. "The family were the Diaz's, but the kid was a minor and went under Witness Protectio... OH..."

James paused upon the realization as to what Toffee was getting at. "I see what you mean, but are you sure that Marco was the Diaz's son? The roommate that was protecting her all those years? Why on Earth didn't you tell me when you had the chance?"

"Believe me," Toffee grunted, putting down his coffee cup, "I was going to bring it up when the opportunity was right. But since you know anyways, I might as well warn you now."

He looked directly into the CEO's eyes, "Marco is the key to the entire success of Explorer. Get him on our side and the plans will succeed."

"And he's crucial to our plans, how?" James grinned, his eyes sparkling.

"You figure it out," Toffee said rather cruelly. "I don't care how you woo him over, just convince him to get onto our side."

Toffee then walked away from the lab table to an open space of air and took out his dimensional scissors. He quickly snipped up a portal, put his head in it, and made a loud whistling noise. When his head poked back out from the dark abyss, several monsters of different shapes and sizes popped from the portal. James was so shocked at the sight of even more grotesque deformities that he almost tripped into his working desk.

"Your reinforcements, sir," Toffee revealed to the startled CEO, "They will obey any command. As long as you teach them the skills, they pick it up rather quickly and efficiently."

Toffee looked back to see two of the monsters, a man-sized chicken and blue deer like monster were squabbling at the back, the big chicken pecking the deer on the head. He turned back to Toffee.

" _Mostly_ efficiently."

* * *

**Mewni Dimension**

When Star had somewhat calmed down, she left her bedroom and descended the stairwell arch to the kingdom's main floor, where she heard a crowd making tons of noises in the Grand Hall of the Kingdom. Her father, King River Butterfly was at the bottom of the steps, leaning against a purple wallpapered wall adjacent to the brown doors of the main hall. When the King saw her, he looked at her with a small smile, knowing full well her daughter was certainly moody.

"Star," the King spoke, "Are you feeling quite alright?"

"Yes," Star said glumly, although she was crying a little on the inside, recovering from the day's events. She gestured her eyes at the brown door right next to them. "What's going on in there?"

"A few people actually managed to escape the blast on Uni and escape safely to our dimension," King Butterfly explained. He realized her daughter had began to perk up upon hearing the news. The King decided to tell her the news that really mattered to her. "...Including King Pony Head and her daughter."

That was certainly enough for Star to hear as she bolted right through the brown doors before her father could get another word out.

"There's always room for improvement," he sighed as he lay along the wall as he was doing before.

* * *

As Star Butterfly rushed into the main hall, brightly illuminated with a dangling golden antique chandelier along the tiled floor, the young Queen immediately made out the figure of the floating unicorn head with the pink mane lounging within the crowd of people. She bumped past the many Mewmans and Uni citizens in the hall, ignoring the curses and insults hurled her way. Star snuck right behind her best friend, and happily hugged her.

"Pony Head! I thought you were dead," she squealed in delight, tears streaming down her eyes. A mix of emotions flooded her mind at the moment, but soon, happiness and content were the only clear emotions vivid from this moment. As she calmed down from the hug, Star could see her pony friend was rather rattled by what had just conspired in the last hour. Pony Head turned around and tried to stay positive for her friend.

"Nothing can take me down, B-Fly," she said, trying her best to make a cheerful impression, "Uh, congratulations on being Queen."

"Aw," Star cooed, the widest grin on her face, "Thanks,"

The bigger floating pony head, Pony Head's father, stood in front of them, "Alright Pony Head, we have to see what we can do for accommodations in Mewni, so you'd better say goodbye to _Star Butterfly_ now," saying Star's name with a tone of distrust. The two pony heads floated away, leaving Star in the middle of the crowd of Uni citizens. She looked through the groups of people, seeing if there was someone out there that she could possibly talk with. A lot of the Uni citizens gawked at the sight of the Queen and immediately wanted to meet her, but she brushed them aside once she saw Prince Dragonfly leaning against a refreshments table, who was pouring himself a red drink from a punch bowl.

"Ah," Prince Dragonfly smiled slyly upon seeing her, "Nice to see you again, m'lady. This fruit punch is good, you should try it sometime."

"That's not fruit punch, Quinn."

"Well then, what on Mewni's Crossing is it?"

Star paused, then quietly whispered in his ear, "Goblin blood."

"Ah," Quinn said, his face beginning to turn green, "Well, excuse me, m'lady, but I think I need to use a toilet right now. I'll be back."

Prince Dragonfly put the cup down on the table and clumsily retreated from the main hall. Star, in order to kill time waiting for Quinn to return, looked around the hall to see the other Uni citizens teary-eyed and worn out from the day's events. Many of the Unians were severed flying heads like Pony Head, or Minotaur-like creatures with unicorn heads, and Star found herself watching the group and drowning in their own shock and sorrow from the events that occured.

Star was confident to make a statement and stood on top of the refreshment table. She took two cups from the table and smashed them together, cracking the cups slightly and making a loud shattering noise. Gradually the commotion from the distraught crowd died down. All the attention was now centered around the blue-gowned princess on top of the gold covered table.

"Hi guys," Star said casually, grinning slightly to the Unians. Most of them looked at her with sullen faces. "I am the Queen of Mewni, for those who didn't know..."

Once the Queen had introduced herself, a ton of murmurs ran across the room. Star quickly shushed them silent.

"I know many of you have been devastated by what has happened on Uni as I am," Star said, "But I will make sure you are safe until this whole thing is taken care of. I will make sure that security is maximized at the Butterfly Kingdom tonight, to make sure the Coronation in a week, as well as any other Unians are not attacked. We will accommodate every Unian with fresh clothes, dinner, and as many sleeping quarters as we can handle. I warn you not leave the castle after sunset, for security's sake. Thank you."

The scared chatter began surfacing again as Star looked around the petrified crowd. Who could've done such a vile thing to these vunerable, scared, people. Star was becoming angrier by the second, seeing how a reckless attack by an evil person could cause so much wretched fear and anger throughout a nation.

When Quinn Dragonfly stumbled back from the bathroom, Star looked at him. He looked like a wreck, as though his lips were just washed with water and wiped. The Queen had thought that it was pretty grotesque at first but managed not to show a reaction.

Quinn mumbled, "So what exactly did I miss?"

Star ducked under the tablecloth of the refreshments table and pulled the prince underneath. Once they were both underneath the tablecloth, Quinn got ready and perked his lips and leaned closer to her, but Star put a hand right to his mouth.

"My mistake," Quinn said, looking a little embarrassed with a tint of red over his pale face, "I thought you wanted to..."

"We have to find out who did this to the Unians and destroy them," Star whispered, interrupting the blonde haired man.

Quinn was exasperated, but he turned to her with a rather stern face, "On our own? You sure none of the nobles can figure this one out?"

"They aren't going to do anything," Star scoffed. She waved an arm angling towards the people from beyond the table in the hall. "But somebody should. You see all those people out there, rattled and terrified about what just happened? What if there's more people like that, or even worse, _deaths_? We can put an end to this, Quinn, and we can move on without the worry of somebody exploding another castle."

"You're probably right," Quinn sighed, stroking his short blonde hair. "But where do we start looking if we want to find the culprit?"

Star took a pair of dimensional scissors and began snipping the air. A blue dimensional portal was cut, as Star gestured to Quinn.

"We go where it started, to Uni."

Quinn rolled his eyes as he followed the blonde Mewman Queen into the portal and promptly closed it behind him.

* * *

**Uni Dimension**

Star and Quinn entered through the abandoned halls of the castle. Everything in the main hall had been utterly destroyed. Floor tiles were moved and shattered out of order, Chandeliers detached from the ceiling and promptly shattered into shards of gold and glass, tables were overturned, and a huge hole bombed through one of the concrete walls. Unicorn blood was plastered on the floor, the floors, everywhere. The castle had somehow submerged to a level underground. Star used her wand as a glowing blue flashlight to make sure the two of them could make their way around the castle.

"If we want to get started," Quinn said, thinking theoretically, "Shouldn't we find out precisely where the blast occurred?"

"Yeah, totally," Star said, moving the wand around. "What do you even think caused such an explosion?"

"Not a simple bomb, that's for certain," Quinn said, looking toward a spirally staircase perched near one of the castle walls. He could see that many of the concrete steps had been chipped off and blackened from ashes till a pit full of brown dirt remained. "Especially since it might've came from underground."

"Underground," Star flinched curiously, running towards the location where Quinn had been and looked down the same staircase. "What makes you think it came from there?"

"Think about it, m'lady," Quinn said, pointing towards the fractured stairs and piles of dirt on top. "An explosion from the level we're at wouldn't cave the entire castle into the ground. Usually it would have to be underground to do that. I'm still baffled as to how an object of such magnitude could've caused the explosion, though."

Quinn looked right behind him, and pointed to something on the marble floor, "Look over there, Star."

Star looked over towards the floor where Prince Dragonfly pointed out. A deep, wide gaping hole was present on the castle's floor. Star walked over and leaned slightly to look at the bottom of the pit. It was as though a surge of energy had burst onto the main floor. Looking down, nothing but free space stood in the way of that and the bottomless, dirt-ridden basement level beneath. Star quickly pointed the wand at the bottom of the deep hole and summoned a thick mattress at the bottom of the pit. She jumped into the hole.

"Hey," Quinn gestured, running towards the pit and looking down, but upon seeing a mattress, he followed suit.

When both Quinn and Star landed on the mattress, Star poofed the mattress away with her wand. They looked around the basement and tried to make out where they were.

"It looks like some kind of Mageantium shard mine," Prince Dragonfly noted.

"Yeah, other than Pixtopia," Star explained, "Uni is known for Mageantium mining."

As they inspected further, the duo a major, glaring problems.

Inspecting the walls of Mageantium, Prince Dragonfly looked at some of the concrete walls with purple rocks. In a nearby mine cart, Prince Dragonfly saw the contents of the cart were completely non-existent, and barely any freshly picked purple Mageantium gems were on the floor.

"If I recall life at a shard mine," Quinn spoke, examining the situation, "I remember that usually those shards would be everywhere on the floor. Mageantium is durable enough to survive an explosion, so where are all the gems? Did the miners have a day off or something?"

Star picked up a disfigured unicorn body strewn across a dismantled treadmill, along with blood splattered on the rocky walls, "Nope, there were definitely workers here at the time."

Quinn cringed in disgust of the dead body, but right after, Quinn and Star found, on a flat part of a mine, a black box with antique plating and a red button on it was mutilated on all sides. An eerie golden eye that popped off the black box was found nearby. Star picked it up with her hand and examined it closely. The golden eye looked rather familiar. Star looked at her arm to find her own blue heart mark with the calligraphic eye. The two eyes were exact replicas of one another, from the shape of the eyelids to the outline of the eye figures. Star was utterly stunned.

"Hey," Star tapped on Quinn's shoulder, "Look at this." Star rolled up her gown sleeve and exposed her arm, showing the curious prince. She then pointed to the golden eye from the box. Quinn spent a few seconds looking between the two eyes.

"Unbelievable," Quinn said, "How did you get that eye on your arm?"

Star spent the next minute explaining the story of the Blood Moon Ball from years ago.

"What do you think it even means?" Star concluded.

"I'm not too sure myself," Quinn thought, looking closer at the eye, and back at the damaged black chest. "Y'know, this eye reminds me of an old folk tale that I was told on Zoomi. I think I know what's up."

"What, exactly?" Star asked.

"This," Quinn said, picking up the remains of the chest, "Is an Underworld tool known as a Pandora's Box."

"Pandora's Box?" Star repeated.

"Yes, Pandora's Box," Quinn said, looking over the box. "When you open it, the world's evil is unleashed."

The prince picked up the box and shoved it into both of Star's hands. "Someone unleashed the evil."

"...and I have a feeling I know who did," Star finished.

* * *

**The Underworld**

A human man in his fifties sat in a chair and looked at himself through a mirror in his large caved bedroom. His skin was wrinkling and his hair was greying. The man felt like his nose would fall right off his face. The man grunted as saw two figures emerge from a dimensional portal, a long blonde-haired woman and a short-haired blue gowned man carrying a sword.

"Hands up, Molotov," the young woman spoke, approaching him from behind, "We know what you did."

The man, Orcus Molotov, raised his hands up slowly. He confidently turned his chair back and smirked at the two figures.

"Ah, Star Butterfly," Molotov said smugly in his thick Russian accent, "Congrats on the promotion. Has da prophecy finally been fulfilled?"

"No. I moved away from Marco years ago." Star said. Dragonfly fumed slightly when he heard her say _that name_ again.

"Aww," Molotov cooed mockingly, "What a pity. The two of you were the cutest couple I've seen in a while. Well, the prophecy did predict that _'the bond would draw 'part'_ , after all. Was I right?"

He then looked at the bigger man beside Star, pointed at him and asked mockingly, "This your new boyfriend or somethin'? The _final challenge_ that broke the bond?"

Star's heart cheeks turned a crimson red for a second, then moved back to neutral pink as she shoved the mutilated black box and golden eye plate into Molotov's arms. She pointed right at the golden eye.

"Stop stalling, old man," Star pressured, "This golden eye is the exact same shape as the heart mark you gave me after the Blood Moon Ball that day. _This_ symbol is the Eye of the Underworld, and _this_ Pandora's Box was used to blow up the Kingdom of Uni. Pretty conclusive, don't you think?"

"So you think I had something to do with Uni," Molotov smirked, a little too suspiciously for Star's tastes, "Star, I only supply those Boxes to other dimensions to make a quick buck. I was going to go ship them to Quest Buy, but I think they have some protocol against explosives..."

"I don't believe you, sir," The blonde-haired man cut in, moving in front of the queen, "Even if you didn't unleash the Pandora's Box on Uni, then you would've given it to someone you trusted. You wouldn't just blindly give it to anyone to take. Especially since the power of blowing dimensions galore is now possible."

Molotov sweated profusely, looking around both ways nervously, He put two fingers into his mouth, and whistled haphazardly. At the sound of the whistle, two slimy red, half-naked demon ogres, each holding a black pitchfork in their hands appeared from a corridor connected to the demon man's bedroom. Star and Quinn found themselves surrounded by two bedrooms walls on their left and right, Molotov from right behind, and imps right in front of them.

"Ooh," a small, skinny demon ogre said, "More blood to feast on, master? What have you gotten Krakog for dinner tonight?"

"Mewman, Krakog," Molotov responded. He pointed at Quinn, "And you?"

"I'm from Zoomi," Quinn replied as he drew his sword in front of the ogres.

"...and Zoomian," Molotov finished, turning to Krakog. The two ogres stood back awkwardly. "Well? You're not gonna get your dinner if you don't KILL THEM!"

Krakog was the first one to strike. Star pointed at Krakog and summoned a freeze spell, the wand summoning a light blue beam from its head. Krakog laughed menacingly as he deflected the laser beam with his pitchfork. The beam aimed straight up and disintegrated once it hit the bedroom ceiling. Star looked up, stunned at the uselessness of her attack.

"Nice try, Miss Butterfly," The old demon man said, "My ogres are immune to magical spells."

Quinn stood between Star and the ogres, sword in hand, preparing for an attack. "Don't worry m'lady, I'll defend you!"

He drew his sword right at the monsters and attacked. Krakog blocked Quinn's attack as the steel sword met the brass pitchfork. The other ogre, who was taller and much more chubbier than Krakog, was ready to stab Quinn from behind. Star gasped. She lunged right at the stocky ogre and jumped in the air, her spiky boots meeting the ogre's face. The skinny ogre stumbled back and fell flat on its back.

"What are you waiting for, Zelot, you imbecile," Molotov scolded the skinnier ogre, "ATTACK THEM!"

Quinn was shocked when he saw what the Queen had just done. As Zelot picked up a pitchfork rallied at Star with another attack, Star, with a quick and powerful punch, knocked the pitchfork in the air. The pitchfork flew so high that the weapon's sharp edges got stuck in the bedroom's stone ceiling. Zelot was now forced to attack by hand.

"My mistake, m'lady," Quinn apologized as he twirled and hacked at Krakog, who was repelling the attacks faintly with his fork, "I never knew you were trained at combat too."

"Yeah, thanks to my parents' royal guard," Star said, smirking, as she kicked Zelot.

"What?"

"Long story. I'll tell you later," Star mumbled, bracing herself for Zelot's next attack.

Zelot was definitely much bigger compared to the small Mewman body of Star Butterfly. Zelot attempted to leap on Star, but Star slipped to her side, as the ogre fell flat on its face. The ogre got up, grabbed Star by the waist and held her tight. Star squeamed at how hard she was being held.

Meanwhile, Quinn kept hacking away at Krakog. He slashed on either angle, hoping to clip either one of the ogre's sides. All the prince's sword was meeting was brass instead as Krakog desperately used the thin hilt of the pitchfork to guard himself. When Krakog finally decided to make an attempt to thrust the blades right into the Zoomian Prince's belly, Quinn caught on, used the sword to push the blade to the side, leaving the ogre's body exposed. Quinn kicked Krakog the belly, causing the ogre to double over in pain. The Zoomian prince finally ended the fight with one horizontal slash to the ogre's body, splitting Krakog into two parts. Krakog was definitely still alive, looking at his legs as they ran out the corridor. Krakog's lower body ran swiftly out of Molotov's bedroom with its small legs, leaving the upper part of the ogre behind.

"MY LEGS," Krakog's upper body cried, his arm reaching out to the direction of the absent legs, "COME BACK!"

On the other side of the room, Star struggled immensely to get out of the large ogre's grasp. Her eyes lit up as she got an idea. She angled her right arm forward and swung it backwards, hitting the ogre right in the groin. The ogre wheezed in pain and loosened his grip. Star broke out of the grip and knocked Zelot to the floor.

The ogre got up again and charged again, Star stepped aside just before the estimated moment of impact, and Zelot clumsily ran right into a stone bedroom wall. He fell back onto the floor with this eyes rolled into the back of his head, knocked out from the sudden impact.

"Ah, just like the old days," Star smirked. She then looked back to find the Prince approaching the frightened old demon man, sword drawn with the point right at the man's neck.

Star walked right over to Molotov and mocked him. "So are you going to tell me who you sold the box to, or is Prince Charming over here going to have to shish-kebab you?"

"You didn't forget!? I am the Demon of Eternal Bonds! Messenger of the Prophecy of Bonded Souls! If you kill me, you also risk destroying your bond with that Earth boy as well!"

Star bluffed for a split second, remembering the bond from all those years ago, hesitant as to whether she wanted to run that risk. Dragonfly looked at her and scoffed. The blonde prince pressed the point of the sword further at Molotov's neck, slightly so it wouldn't pierce through his wrinkly human-like skin.

"She wouldn't care. Right, Star?" Dragonfly said coldly, turning back to the Queen. Star said nothing.

Molotov looked even more petrified, objectified by the nonsensical words spewing from his lips and his squirming in his seat. "B-b-b-b-buht..."

Star looked right at the prince, and noticed at how ruthless he acted in combat. His aggression was carrying him close to harming the old man, and Star reminisced back to the dream where Dragonfly had threatened Marco.

 _Is he even someone to trust?_ Star asked herself, but quickly shook herself out of her trance, remembering what she had came to do.

"You said the bond would break either way," Star reacted, with a tone of harshness in her voice, "Killing you wouldn't change anything. Now tell me what I need to know, and we won't harm you."

"Monsters," Molotov said in his thick Russian accent, still sweating deeply "I sold it to a band of monsters led by that grey lizard, what's his name again, Toffee."

"Toffee," Star said to herself, pulling out her wand and pointing the head straight at the demon man, "That's a lie. Toffee died when the Monster's castle blew up years ago."

"Well, he certainly isn't dead, if I talked to him face to face about the deal."

" _Well_ , where is he?"

"How would I know!?" the old man yelped in his chair, "He left right after I sold him the box!"

"ARE YOU SURE?" Star said in a booming voice as Quinn shoved the sword closer to Molotov's neck.

"YES," Molotov shouted, his hands in front of his face, "

Star shoved the wand into her star-shaped pocket. Quinn hesitantly moved his sword away from Molotov's throat, both of them staring blankly at the other.

"He really doesn't know. C'mon," Star said as she sliced the air with her Dimensional Scissors and walked into the portal produced by the scissors, "We've hit a dead end, let's go."

Quinn reluctantly stepped into the portal, but just before he could fully enter, he stuck his head out of the portal and glared right at Molotov before closing the portal behind him.

Molotov shuddered. He grabbed a small pocket mirror from his pocket and spoke into it quietly.

"Boss? Ya, those rotten Mewmans are after yeh!"

* * *

**Mewni Dimension**

The portal ended Quinn and Star on a stone porch right outside of Star's royal bedroom. The night sky was glazed with a dreamy purple color, with stars glittering and spread out among the purple canvas.

"Man, that was exhausting," the Queen said as a yawn spread across her face. "I can't believe we came up short."

She sighed, "Well, there's always tomorrow..."

Quinn took the atmosphere in and leaned on the balcony balustrade, sighing. Star noticed that the prince looked a bit worrisome as he stared blankly into the sky, lost in his own little world. Star leaned on the balustrade right next to him and looked at the prince with concern.

"Hey," Star said, snapping her fingers to get the Prince's attention, "Is something wrong?"

The prince looked at her sullenly for a short second, then turned back to the sky. "Star, can I ask you something?"

"Ask away."

"That Earth friend you speak about, Marco, you were close to him, weren't you?"

Star leaned her back on the balcony ledge and blushed. "Yes, he was my best friend on Earth. Your point?"

"I don't know," Quinn replied, "You seemed really attached to him. You kept hesitating when you were talking to that demon guy."

Quinn turned directly to the princess and looked right into the Queen's cold blue eyes. "I don't know. I mean, I was sent here to be your suitor, but it seems like you already have a man that you love already, so what's the point of me staying on Mewni?"

Star grabbed the prince's arm. "First off, Marco- _was_ not my boyfriend. Second off..."

Star leaned closer to the prince and wrapped him around in the hug, "...I had my own adventures with Marco back on Earth. I used to think nothing could replace those memories. But... after today... I feel that our own adventures will be just as great."

The Prince wrapped his arms around her as they tightened into a deep hug. When Star relaxed from the hug, she looked into the prince's eyes dreamily. The two stood there, holding hands for what seemed like an eternity, before Quinn broke away and headed back into the palace via Star's bedroom.

"Farewell m'lady," Quinn said, waving to the queen before closing her bedroom door behind him, "I will see you tomorrow."

This time, however, the nickname did not bother the young maiden.

Star crawled into her Queen sized bed, thinking about Quinn and she felt warm for one of the first times as queen.

* * *

When Star fell asleep, the vision with Prince Dragonfly and Marco Diaz swam right back to her. She saw Marco, sitting in a wooden chair, while Prince Dragonfly swung his sword around haphazardly, with a gruesome grin plastered over his face.

 _"Tell me something, if you could choose one of us to live, would you spare me... or him?"_ said Quinn, as he pointed the sharp end of the sword to Marco's back.


	13. Dwell

* * *

**ONE WEEK LATER**

* * *

**Explorer Corporation  
** **Earth Dimension**

James Martin was rather groggy when he shut the laboratory door right behind him. His long, curly black hair was in tatters and his Los Angeles Kings fan t-shirt was wrinkled from all over. His breath reeked of coffee. His body swayed from left to right as he looked right at the menacing grey lizard standing right in the red carpet corridor.

"After years of testing, months of experimentation, and a whole week of mass production," James said triumphantly, announcing his revelation to a nonexistent world, "I have finally finished the greatest invention known to man!"

Toffee slow-clapped the fatigued yet eager middle-aged inventor.

"Congratulations, Einstein," Toffee said, a sarcastic tone in his voice. "Did any of my slav- er, I mean, minions cause you any trouble?"

"Trouble," James replied with a yawn, "Don't get me started on those guys, remind me that that one guy, Potato-Baby or something, should never touch a soldering iron again. Oh yeah, and that Fat Chicken, yeah, he keeps starting fights with everybody, especially that bull, Emmitt..."

James looked on the verge of collapse from the fatigue. The grey lizard had to take the man's arms to hold him upright.

"How much sleep did you get, out of curiosity?" Toffee asked.

"Easy, Mr. Lizard-Man," James said, chuckling a bit through his sleep deprivation, "Twenty-four hours multiplied by seven days equals to a maximum of one hundred and sixty eight hours awake!"

"I can tell," Toffee said, removing his grip on James's hands. James stumbled a bit but managed to regain his balance. "Your breath reeks of coffee."

"Well, you might want to stop being such a critic then," James retorted, yawning again, "It's not natural for a living being to live with such negativity. Besides, you would've given me some sleep if you weren't so insistent to have mass production end this week."

"Negativity is a different entity compared to realism," Toffee rebutted, "Just clean up at home and go to sleep, you've certainly worked hard enough to warrant a rest."

James shook his head, waddling a bit from side to side, "No, no, no, no. I'm afraid I can't do that. I have to host an Explorer Corporation employees' dinner."

"What," Toffee stuttered, "I didn't hear anything about a dinner."

"Yeah," James said, waving his arms up in the air. "A dinner. Whenever we finish a huge project within the labs, I always treat some of my employees with a fancy dinner."

"Couldn't you just postpone it to tomorrow or something?"

"Nah, besides, I have some very important guests who I believe can, one, help make use of this great project, and two, help you achieve your goals."

"Oh really," the lizard said slyly, golden eyes locked onto the long-haired man, "Tell me who they are."

James leaned close to Toffee's ear pouch around the scales on his head and whispered right into it. Toffee's emotionless expression twisted as he gave a light grin. When James backed off, Toffee began to cackle.

"Oh boy, that is a great idea," Toffee exclaimed to James indirectly, "I've never heard anything like it, whew! I like the way you think, James Martin. It's much better than what I originally had in mind. I didn't think that you were willing to go there, I am impressed."

James shrugged casually. "My laboratory team kills rats every single day trying to find a cure for incurable diseases. What's to say that the casualties can't go further in number?"

Toffee then prompted the Explorer CEO by raising his arm in the direction of the corridor, "Go ahead and send your little wedding invitations. Then you can show me how this masterpiece functions."

Just as the man was about to step foot out of the door, he stopped himself and turned back to Toffee. "One request sir."

"Yes?"

"I believe that the chair of the board at _Explorer_ should be present at such a momentous occasion. Take one of your many potions or something to blend in." James said indirectly at Toffee.

"Alright, I'll be out front in a second," Toffee gulped nervously as he re-entered the Laboratory.

* * *

Marco and Connor opened the grey metal doors of the MechLab as yet another workweek was done and in the bag. The only particular difference from this end compared to the last week was that Marco was now staring at a flat piece of white construction paper in his hand.

"Man," Marco said, "I think I kinda have a theory as to why your dad looked awful today. He keeps on partying!"

Connor chuckled a little and smiled, "'I think that's because he doesn't even rest. He was apparently working with some third-party company on finishing this mainstream project. We'll see what he's been up to tonight."

"True that," Marco noted, still holding the invitation, "But that doesn't explain why he wants us to get dressed up if it's just a casual dinner."

"Well, apparently," Connor said as the two men stopped in the main lobby, near the red chairs strewn in the center of the hall, "My dad has booked the exquisite Le Expensive for the night's big occasion."

"Le Expensive," Marco said to himself, pondering the name, "Don't see how they get any business with that name. Some kind of fancy violin-playing restaurant where wallet size is more important than the quality of the food?"

"Close, Marco," he said, pinching his fingers together. "By that much. Otherwise, yeah, you're right. French-Italian fusion, to be exact."

"French-Italian, huh," Marco said, "Thank goodness it's not another Mexican place. Let's just say I had a bad experience with those dairy horchatas."

"Ooh, I wouldn't imagine," Connor said with a smile. He was definitely more comfortable than he had been in the last week, especially from talking to Marco. "Can you gimme a lift at my place tonight?"

"Oh, yeah sure," Marco said, pausing for a minute, "Where is your house?"

"It's near the intersection of Riverside and Wesson Court. Um, 32 Wesson Court to be exact."

To Marco, all he heard were the words _Wesson Court_ , remembering that, several blocks away was the Thomas household where his crush, Jackie, had lived. He got a vision where the energetic blonde Star Butterfly had coaxed him into going to and delivering Jackie flowers.

 _"C'mon Marco, Jackie will love those pretty red roses,"_ Star's voice echoed in Marco's head. Marco froze up and stared blankly. He stood there for a few seconds until he saw a hand with snapping fingers right in front of him.

The click between the two fingers got Marco to shake out of his trance, as Connor stared at him rather suspiciously.

"Um, you okay Marco," his friend asked with concern. "W-was it something I said?"

"No, not at all," Marco said, dismissing his friend's concern for him, "I just- blanked out, that's all."

"Oh, alright," Connor said, smiling back at Marco, "Er, I do that too sometimes. Usually remembering things from the past. Bad stuff with my own father. Stuff like that."

"Yeah," Marco said, "Looks like we both have trouble letting go, eh?"

* * *

Marco bumped open the brown mahogany door of his apartment, leaving it wide open. The first thing he went to was the fridge. Just as he opened the white door, however, he heard a rattling noise from right behind him.

He looked behind him for a quick second and immediately met a couple of red ocelli staring right at him. The eyes belonged a large spider about the size of his coffee table, with eight furry black limbs and a large back body. Marco's eyes widened and he let out a holler at the grotesque sight.

The spider attempted to pin Marco to the fridge with its front limbs, but Marco used his arms to push the spider's limbs off him. Once the black limbs flung off his own arms, Marco used his quick reactions and swiftly reached for a chopping knife from his wooden stand on the kitchen counter. Marco flimsily held it in a jabbing position, ready to lunge at the giant spider pinning him down.

Just before he could make a move, he heard a scream from below him. "STOP!"

Marco loosened his grip on the knife and looked down. His intensity died down when he saw the small, green bird monster, Ludo, right at his feet. Ludo was still here, living with Marco. The black spider looked right at Ludo and sneered.

"Yes yes," Ludo said, responding to the spider. "I'll get some chips for you, darling. You've earned it, I guess."

He turned right over to Marco. "Toss me those bag of chips in the counter."

Marco looked over and saw a yellow bag of _Gold'n Crispz_ on the same kitchen counter. He put away the kitchen knife in his hand and tossed the chips down to the ground for the small bird monster to pick up. Ludo opened the bag of chips and opened the end of the bag for the spider to put its head in and eat the bag's contents. Once it pokes its head out of the monster, Ludo gave it a pat on the head.

"Alright, alright," Ludo said, "That's good, girl. Now go back and see if Eagle is back from her flight. Go, go, go."

The spider turned around and headed right out of the open door and down the exterior steps of the apartment. Marco sighed as he turned back to the fridge and grabbed a glass bottle of beer. He had stepped away from the light beer and turned to more alcoholic beverages. Before he managed to sip, Ludo greeted him.

"So, Marco," Ludo said with a small smile, "How was your work?"

"The usual," Marco said dismissively, shunting back to the apartment door and shutting it tight. He then proceeded to take a sip from the brown glass bottle. "Also Ludo, no pets allowed. Landlord's gonna have a grab on me."

"You and your rules," Ludo sighed, staring right at the bigger man. "No wonder the princess always thought you were the safe kid."

"Oh goodness, did Star get that to you too?"

"I knew enough, Marco."

Marco then proceeded to take yet another sip of his beer. He went to the closet and pulled out a dark black tuxedo with a white shirt underneath. Hanging on the same rack was a red tie. Ludo looked up to it, eyes glimmering.

"Ooh, that thing," Ludo said, "I remember that."

"Yeah, it was the same one me and Star used to kick your butt at prom," Marco muttered, taking the black suit and trying it on. It was still a perfect match. "It'll do."

"Do you have something big to do tonight?"

"Yeah, my boss booked this fancy restaurant for this employee dinner tonight. 'Gotta wear the tux."

Marco took a third sip of the beer while Ludo looked up. "Y'know, what exactly is that bottle you've been sipping? You always seem tired after drinking it for a while."

The man held the bottle down to Ludo for him to read. "If you wanna try it, be my guest."

Ludo nodded. "Sure."

Marco then tipped the bottle over to let a bit of the liquid pour out, while the drops fell right into Ludo's mouth. The bird gulped the droplets down his throat for a second, then began to gag.

Marco went into the bathroom with the suit.

"Turn around," Marco commanded the bird. The bird turned away from the bathroom door as Marco shut it right behind him.

"That tastes horrible," the bird exclaimed, "Why are you even drinking that thing?"

"A lot of people drink alcohol," Marco replied, his voice echoing from the bathroom door. "We don't drink it for the taste."

"Then why on Earth do you drink something like this?"

"I dunno," Marco explained, "People drink it for many reasons. It has a substance that helps them relax, other people drink it to make themselves feel happy, maybe even _forget an old past_."

"You certainly aren't using it to relax, Marco," Ludo replied, noticing his slurry tone. "You can handle intensity. Otherwise half of my army wouldn't have succumbed to you and the princess. Plus, I don't see you any happier from drinking it everyday."

Ludo then heard the bathroom door creak open, and out came Marco, wearing his stunning outfit, ready for the party. He walked right to the living room couch and slumped right down onto it.

"Maybe I was trying to forget, or maybe it just makes me feel good, okay," Marco snapped. "I mean, how can someone recover when, years ago, you have all of these crazy adventures to interstellar dimensions, putting your karate to good use against your own monsters, having a one-in-a-million best friend be a princess from another dimension? Now it's all gone down the gutter, just because your best friend had to move away and become the Queen of a dimension no one on Earth's heard about, and you were reduced down going to college and finding a job?!"

Ludo stood silent for a while, taking in the Hispanic man's rant. He then hopped right onto the couch's arm and sat right beside Marco, his beer in one hand.

"Y'know Marco," Ludo replied, rather sympathetic to the man next to him. "I might be a few sandwiches short of a picnic, but I can tell that you miss Star Butterfly. Ever since she left, you've felt your life was completely meaningless, thus you're using alcohol to help it find some meaning."

"...and I'm pretty sure it was meaningless before, too," Marco pouted.

"Y'know," Ludo said, reminiscing, "I remember that after my castle blew up and I was banished to the wilderness in Mewni, I was always thinking. Always thinking about surviving at day. But at night, I was thinking about what my monsters were doing, and if they actually survived. I mean, everyone scattered right after the castle blew up, and Toffee, I'm not too sure what happened to him."

Marco took another sip of the beer as Ludo continued his story. "Then, one day, I was in an abandoned area of Mewni. There's a little tavern in the forest, full of rat patrons. I scared them off before, so they all knew to respect my authority." he said, chuckling.

"So I'm waiting by the bar, deciding to order a drink, but then, out of the corner of my eye, I see Buff Frog. He's there, with his small tadpole babies. He was just there, feeding his tadpoles a mud dinner, in a booth a few seats away from the bar I was sitting at. He sees me. I see him. We don't say anything to each other except a nod and a smile. Then I remember."

"What do you remember," Marco asked.

"The reason behind living, of course," Ludo said, "I saw Buff Frog move on with his life. He's happy. I mean, he has a family! Seeing him with his family made me think back on the past. Buff Frog wouldn't be as happy as he is without me adopting him from the swamps, nor would he have been here hadn't I given him the tadpoles to care for in the first place. I saw how I made his life better and remembered the great times we had together, although _most of those times_ was with you and Miss Butterfly kicking us silly."

"Your point?" Marco pressed, "I don't quite see your point."

"Marco," Ludo said, smiling. "Being envious of your own past doesn't make you any more happier. People say that dwelling on the past is a bad thing, but moping on the present is just as bad. You have to enjoy what you have currently and notice there's always another step ahead of you, while remembering the past events that have shaped who you are. That's what I realized from my time in the wilderness. You can remember the great times you had with Star Butterfly and how you made an impact on her life, but you can also focus on those friends you have, like that skater girl, and that guy you told me about, Connie."

"Connor," Marco corrected. "Y'know, I didn't think you were that wise, Ludo."

"I'm older than I look, Marco," Ludo said modestly. "I'm actually pretty old in monster years. I've seen things."

"Ah," Marco said, downing the last sip of beer. He then tossed the glass bottle right onto the wooden coffee table in front of him, as the bottle shattered into a ton of pieces. "You should do that more often then."

"And you should start smashing beer bottles less often," Ludo muttered, "Loud and dangerous."

"I think I might stop, actually."

"Well," Ludo said, "if you really want to visit Star, just ask for my dimensional scissors if you'd like. I think I owe you something, honestly."

Marco's eyes lit up. Definitely the offer was tempting, and Marco certainly wanted to see Star sometime in the future. But yet again, Star was probably going to be Queen rather soon, and had no time to see any common peasant like him. Still, he thought it would be good to see his good friend again.

"Yeah that would be great, maybe some other time," Marco muttered.

"Let me know when you're ready to visit, and I can warp you a ticket to Mewni in a heartbeat," Ludo said, jumping off the chair's arm. "Now excuse me, I have to find my girls."

The bird monster opened the door and strode out of the complex. Marco smiled. Ludo was right, after all. He began not to think about the pain of his current predicament, instead thinking back to the great memories and adventures he had with Star. It made him feel better and made him feel energized. He felt like he was able to power up and sweep the shards from the living room carpet. But as he tried to pick himself up, alcohol caused his drowsiness to sweep over his brain processing. All he wanted to do instead was sleep. But before he could, he grabbed the smartphone from his pocket, tapped the screen several times with this thumb, and set an alarm to an hour before six, giving him more than enough time to get ready for the party.

Then, just like a human battery, his energy drained and he fell into a deep slumber.


End file.
